{"id":118869,"date":"2024-09-03T13:00:01","date_gmt":"2024-09-03T17:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/?p=118869"},"modified":"2026-02-18T15:52:50","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T19:52:50","slug":"172-michelle-ryan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/172-michelle-ryan\/","title":{"rendered":"Episode 172. \u201cWe saved for retirement but have no money to spend NOW\u201d (Part 1)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe title=\"\u201cWe saved for retirement but have no money to spend NOW\u201d\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Hs3n_bVm4AU\" width=\"100%\" height=\"400\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><iframe style=\"border-radius: 12px;\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/episode\/4SDfdgkYEhzvOtSbCOFRlf?utm_source=generator\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Michelle is 42, Ryan is 43. They\u2019ve been married for 9 years and share two young children. Michelle worries about money; she always has. Ryan knows they\u2019re in trouble, but can\u2019t say no to their kids. On one income, spending outpaces earning\u2014slowly draining their savings and weighing them down with dread over the future.<\/p>\n<p><strong>This episode is brought to you by:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Netsuite | Get visibility to everything in your business\u00a0in\u00a0one place. Sign up and defer payments, with no interest, for six months at\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/iwt.com\/netsuite\">https:\/\/iwt.com\/netsuite<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Superhuman | Get a free month of lightning fast email at\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/try.sprh.mn\/ramitsethi\">https:\/\/try.sprh.mn\/ramitsethi<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>DeleteMe | If you want to get your personal information removed from the web, go to\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/ramit<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0for 20% off.<\/p>\n<p>Facet | Get affordable, accessible financial planning with a flat fee membership. For a limited time, the $250 enrollment fee will be waived when you sign up at\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/facet.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/facet.com\/ramit<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>99 Designs | Get $50 off your first design contest at\u00a0<strong><a href=\"http:\/\/99designs.com\/ramit\">99designs.com\/ramit<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<h2><strong>Link mentioned in this episode<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/173-michelle-ryan?__hstc=145147563.606c87db1861fecdc1ed77ab822a9231.1742307787549.1742853011818.1742908926448.27&amp;__hssc=145147563.114.1742908926448&amp;__hsfp=412717538\">\u201cWe spend 113% of what we make\u2014but can\u2019t do anything to fix it\u201d (Part 2)<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><strong>Show Transcript<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>[00:00:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0On today\u2019s episode\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:02]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0We are stuck with everything that we currently have. We stopped dreaming. You can\u2019t dream at 113%.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:08]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0I definitely feel stuck most days. I\u2019m just trying to survive.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:11]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Meet Michelle and Ryan. Michelle is 42, and she is a worrier.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:15]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0He doesn\u2019t think twice. We missed the credit card payment by a couple of days. This is horrifying to me. He\u2019s like, eh, do better next month. I think I would like an equal worrier.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Ryan is 43, and he refuses to worry about money. Ryan, you don\u2019t worry about money, right?<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:30]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0No, I\u2019m going to say not anymore. I made decisions based on money that, in hindsight, I later regretted. And I just at some point said, I\u2019m never doing that again.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:38]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0As we dig deeper, we learn that Michelle is resentful of how her relationship with money was different than Ryan\u2019s when she was growing up.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:46]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0When I\u2019m sitting there babysitting with my several side hustles at age 24 watching Suze Orman, this guy is out in Australia, living it up, racking up the credit cards because he could. He had a place to fall back to; I did not.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Can Michelle and Ryan see beyond the past and stop the bleeding so they can start living their rich life today? This is a crisis.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:07]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Look at the spreadsheet; it\u2019s not working.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:08]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0It really is death by a thousand paper cuts.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:10]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0I think big changes need to be made. I think I\u2019m a little afraid to make them.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:14]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s dig in with Michelle and Ryan.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:27]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I was probably panicking because that\u2019s usually what I\u2019m doing. We had fairly recently a credit card bill. I had to text him to be like, hey, can you pay this? And I got the, oh, hold on. I think I have to transfer over money for that. I never get that response from him. I was like, what do you mean? And I realized because the balance of the credit card bill, which we pay in full, basically matched the income for the month. So then I was like, yeah, we\u2019re in trouble.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:57]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. So usually a couple of times a year I got to take money from the savings account, shifted into the checking account. That way we can cover the credit card bill.<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:07]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You were just casual about incurring a late fee from your credit card?<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:12]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I probably would have been, all right, whatever. You know what? That stinks. I don\u2019t want to pay it. Let\u2019s just say it\u2019s the cost of doing life. I should have been more responsible. I\u2019ll make sure I\u2019m better next time for it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:30]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I actually said this to him over time that I feel like I have a very physical connection and response to spending money. I can physically feel it when I\u2019m spending it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Where do you feel it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:44]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0In my entire body, mostly in my chest and my belly is mostly where I feel it. But for him, I feel like you\u2019re like, hey, you got 20 bucks? Yeah, sure. Here you go. He doesn\u2019t think twice. Oh, we missed the credit card payment by a couple of days. It\u2019s a little over 100 bucks of interest. This is like horrifying to me. He\u2019s like, ah, do better next month. Whereas I have to call now and get one of my several one-time courtesies and get these things waived, where if it were him, he would just let it ride.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:18]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Is that how you would describe the basic dynamic of the relationship? You are worried, Michelle, and Ryan is along for the ride?<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:30]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0In terms of the worry and concern, 100%. Yeah, I\u2019d say I\u2019m the worrier, and he\u2019s the passenger of the worry. I think I would like an equal worrier.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:41]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:43]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I guess. I want someone to be as concerned as I am.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:46]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And you mentioned you feel it in your chest and stomach. Just so I\u2019m making sure I get this right, this is a negative feeling about money, right? Do you ever feel positive about money?<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:56]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. When I see that things are going well. Maybe it\u2019s not. I don\u2019t know. Maybe it never feels truly good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0In your mind, Michelle, does worrying about money equal caring about money?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:14]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. It really is an overload. It\u2019s overwhelmed. It\u2019s exhaustion. It\u2019s the panic and then the, oh, we\u2019re okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And is there a world where you can care about money without worrying about it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:38]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I hope so.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:39]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And Ryan, you don\u2019t worry about money, right?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:43]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m going to say not anymore. I try not to. I made decisions based on money that in hindsight I later regretted, and I just at some point said, I\u2019m never doing that again.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:55]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What was an example?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:57]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0When we got our house. So when I save money to buy the house, I pretty much cut off frivolous spending, cut off a lot of socializing, everything. Save, save, save, save, save, save. Got to save, got to save, got to save, got to hit that number, that number, that number. There was no more Starbucks. There was no more coffee. There was no nothing. And I got there.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:19]\u00a0And by the time you got to the table with the closing costs and this, that, and the other thing, the\u2013 let\u2019s say, 50 bucks I might have spent on a Friday night going out with some friends would not have made or broken that entire situation. I don\u2019t want to get back to that point where I\u2019m so worried about every penny.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:42]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So you bought this house and you told yourself, I buckled down for this. Did you feel a sense of pride at being able to buy the house?<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:53]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, there was a sense of pride in it, almost followed by immediate sense of regret.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:58]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Well, that\u2019s every homeowner. Michelle, were you in the picture when Ryan bought the house? Were you two together?<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:07]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0So, no, we were not together at the time. I was part of the friend group though. So we, the friend group, I distinctly remember making fun of this valiant effort to scrape together all these [Inaudible], like, no, Ryan\u2019s not coming. Ryan\u2019s not coming. He\u2019s got to save for the house. And another friend would be like, well, why doesn\u2019t he just open up the garage and take out half those toys in there and sell them? And then he\u2019s got his down payment.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:35]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0First of all, what toys were in the garage, Ryan? Just tell me.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:38]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0In the beginning there was two motorcycles and a convertible.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:45]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right. I get it. Are those gone? Are they still there?<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:52]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0The one motorcycle is still there. The convertible is still there, but the one motorcycle is up for sale.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:57]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, okay. It\u2019s funny, Michelle, that you mentioned you would make fun of him like, oh, this guy\u2019s not going to come anymore because he\u2019s got to save his money. But now you are the one who is intensely worried about personal finances. How did that flip?<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Before we hear her answer, I need a quick favor from you. If you\u2019re enjoying this show, please hit the Subscribe button. It really helps my team and me.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:18]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I really haven\u2019t changed over time. The thing is, I would never just make a decision to buy a house and then suddenly have a few months to scrape together a down payment. That\u2019s not how I roll. It\u2019s never how I rolled.<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:32]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Why not?<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:33]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Even in my 20s, I was saving for this point in my life where I don\u2019t think Ryan\u2019s had the foresight. I\u2019m currently living in what I planned for in my 20s. I planned for this only I didn\u2019t go beyond this. I think I planned up to here.<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:52]\u00a0When he went to buy this house, there was like a scrambling to get together $4,000, and we were in the same friend group at the time, and I remember making fun of that with the other friends. Like, this guy has to scramble to get $4,000 together.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:04]\u00a0That\u2019s the other thing that right from the beginning, I held that against you. I\u2019m like, what do you mean? You\u2019ve had a real job making 60 grand a year, and you\u2019ve been living home for the first four years of this job and you are scrambling to save $4,000?<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:16]\u00a0That\u2019s incomprehensible to me. I would\u2019ve had 200 grand in the bank by now. How come you have zero?\u00a0Obviously, not ready to buy a house. How come no one\u2019s telling him this? And so he still got it anyway.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:27]\u00a0And then you go down the line in the years. It\u2019s always me tugging him along through every financial milestone. We\u2019re here because of you. You bought this house like this. I\u2019m tripping over that cat and that kid and that toy because of you, and now we can\u2019t fix it because you lived it up back in the day and I never got the chance to, and we\u2019re still here, dude. So that\u2019s where all the resentment comes from.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:51]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Did you notice how Michelle spent a lot of time talking about her feelings around money and how they were almost all negative?\u00a0She talked about how she feels the negative sensations of money in her body. She mentioned feeling resentment that Ryan hadn\u2019t saved more, even though he did a crash savings plan and bought a house.<\/p>\n<p>[00:09:09]\u00a0And when I asked her if she ever felt good about money, she gave me an ambivalent answer. These are clues, big clues that I want to dig into.\u00a0Michelle, of course, is a worrier, and Ryan is along for the ride. He\u2019s probably an avoider. I noticed that he\u2019s got what he calls toys in his garage. By the way, why is it that men always call their expensive impulse purchases toys? Can anyone tell me? I\u2019m going to ask how they grew up with money. Before I get into it, what do you think they\u2019re going to say?<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:09:44]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s take it back to your childhood. What do you remember about your parents saying about money or your family?<\/p>\n<p>[00:09:49]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0It was always a source of contention. There was never enough. Then child of divorce. So then it was like, did dad pay the child support? Child support wasn\u2019t enough. Never had enough for this, that, and the other thing. We ended up living with my grandparents on my mom\u2019s side. I didn\u2019t come out of childhood with any money. I\u2019m sure people gave me cash for gifts at some point.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:12]\u00a0I saw none of it. I came out with nothing, and I built it all myself. So I knew that if I were going to survive going forward, that I had me and me alone to rely on. My parents, the people who were supposed to take care of me really didn\u2019t. They made me instead feel like a burden wherever I went.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:39]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That sucks. I\u2019m sorry to hear that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:41]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. You take it and you move on.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:45]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Were you the first to go to college in your family?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:47]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:48]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wow. Congratulations. That\u2019s amazing. That\u2019s really cool. How did you pay for it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:54]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I went there for one year and I ran out of money. I was about, I think, 8,000 short to go back the second year and I was like, this is my problem when I leave. So I\u2019m going to leave here and go to a state school instead and not come out buried under debt.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:12]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So in your early 20s, it sounds like you started saving aggressively.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:17]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:18]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Okay. What was driving that? What did you think about money at the time, and what did you feel as you started to save more?<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:26]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I had zero for a while. I was breaking even for a while. I remember very distinctly I was $20 short. I think it was exactly $20 short for my car insurance bill at the time. And the office that I was working, it was right around Christmas, and I went in at night. I had left something behind and I went in and there was a card on my desk. One of the employees had left a card to say happy holidays with the 20-dollar bill in it. So things like that. I always managed to find it when I needed it, so to speak.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:57]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What did that teach you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:02]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0To not totally lose faith. That even though I grew up being let down, that not everyone will let you down. There\u2019s still hope around the corner.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:17]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you for walking me through that. That\u2019s super helpful. Ryan, can I ask you the same question? What do you remember about your family growing up?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:24]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0As a kid, I remember hearing a lot of, we don\u2019t have money for that. As let\u2019s say that 17-year-old who wanted a new car, there\u2019s no money for that. But the little 1000-dollar car that I bought, when that broke down, they had no problem covering a repair when it needed it. If something came up, it could always get handled and managed. So I think they just budgeted it well. But I wouldn\u2019t say there was a lot of ever talking about it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Ryan, did you ever talk to Michelle about her upbringing with money and similarly did you share your upbringing with it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:06]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0We\u2019ve definitely had talks here and there.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:10]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019ve told you little stories because they\u2019re so different from his. With the SATs, I\u2019m like, oh man, this is $200 to pay for the SATs. Ask your mom. Ask your dad. I asked my guidance counselor who figured out how to get it paid for. Or there was a field trip that came up and I needed $100 above what we could afford. So my music teacher actually let me help her paint in her house so that I could earn the money to go on this trip. That kind of stuff I think is so far beyond what Ryan can\u2013 he grew up not like that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Why not talk about that, out of curiosity?<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:47]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Something that just comes up. It just comes up here and there in little tidbits. I don\u2019t think you really go on that whole depressing journey in one. Like right now.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s very interesting, Michelle, because I could tell you, I hear some pain in your story, but when I think about your story, Michelle, I do not think about depressing. That\u2019s not how I hear it. I hear somebody who grew up in a family where parents were divorced, money was lacking.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:19]\u00a0It was an issue throughout childhood. And then I hear someone who said, I\u2019m not going to let that define me. I\u2019m going to find a way. What\u2019s depressing about that? To me, that is incredible. Ryan, you ever reflected on Michelle\u2019s journey like that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:42]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0For her to jump, not only one bad hurdle, but 100 bad hurdles, it\u2019s very, very impressive.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:52]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I agree. What you both just revealed is so illuminating. I feel like I just shined a flashlight on your history and I can see something I couldn\u2019t see before. Now, if I had three kids, ages 7, 5, and 3, you better believe I\u2019d be wanting to tell these stories all the time. Because they connect your kids to where you came from. Michelle, do you think your kids are going to struggle by not having $20 like you did?<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:25]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0No, because they\u2019ll have someone to call.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Exactly. So therefore, don\u2019t you think it\u2019s even more important for them to know where mom came from?<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:37]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, probably.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:40]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0This is how we create legacies. This is what generational wealth really is. That right there.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What a beautiful moment. Sometimes we don\u2019t realize how important our stories are\u2013 the good, the bad, all of it. Those stories made you who you are. I\u00a0have stories that I love to share, like the story about how my parents took my sisters to UC Berkeley, when they were little, and my dad would take them to the math and science buildings every year and he would say, one day, you can go here.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:10]\u00a0And they didn\u2019t even make it to the main area of college where all the college kids are.\u00a0They just would sit outside the math and science buildings, and my dad would tell them that. And that is exactly where they ended up going. And the story about how I applied to multiple colleges, but the $50 fee was a lot. So I put a Post-it note in the envelope saying, listen, this is a lot of money, so please waive the fee, but if you really need it, contact me, and I will find a way to get the money.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:36]\u00a0And then I got into my first choice. These are stories that define us. It\u2019s so important for us to look inside, to remember our own stories and then to share them. And don\u2019t be ashamed if these stories are not perfect. They\u2019re your stories. Tell them to your spouse, tell them to your friends, and definitely tell them over and over to your children because they are a connection to where you came from. Let\u2019s get back to Michelle, who in her screening interview, told us about her interest with personal finance, and it\u2019s quite revealing, especially the last part.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:09]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m like the financial gurus spiral out person. So I\u2019ve been watching Suze Orman since I was 24 years old. Then I recently found the FIRE community. I was like, ooh, now I learned a lot of technicalities, like the 4% rule, rule of 72.\u00a0I heard more about that through the FIRE community, but it\u2019s no longer working for us.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:29]\u00a0I\u2019m so far buried in my spreadsheet that I have no idea how to step back and fix it. I have no solutions\u00a0I\u00a0spent so much time in my younger years setting up for retirement that I never really considered the right now.\u00a0So what am I saving for? What are we saving for? We don\u2019t know what we\u2019re saving for down the line.\u00a0I started\u2013 it was a spiral. I was spiraling. I\u2019m staring at an empty spot on the couch. I have nobody to vent it to. I got to talk to Ramit. I need to see if I can get on this, have him talk me down.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:05]\u00a0I\u2019m a long time Suze Orman fan, followed a lot of her stuff. She never talked about spending, but I got the savings part down from her, standing in your truth and all that good stuff. Then I found your stuff and that\u2019s where the spending stuff came in, which I had never really considered before.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:22]\u00a0Then I read Die with Zero, and I think that one put me over the edge. Because now I\u2019m like, great, I\u2019m spending all this life energy. I\u2019m the ant, and Ryan\u2019s the grasshopper is what took me over the edge a little bit, is that I married a grasshopper.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:42]\u00a0Bill Perkins talks about in the beginning of the book, where you have an ant and a grasshopper, and the ant works really hard throughout the summer to make sure that there was enough food stored for winter while a grasshopper was out partying and hanging out and loving life. And then we all know what happened to the grasshopper who starved to death in winter. And while the ant survived, was she really happy?<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:06]\u00a0I was like, oh my God, I married a grasshopper.\u00a0So when I\u2019m sitting there babysitting with my several side hustles at age 24, watching Suze Orman, this guy is out in Australia, living it up, racking up the credit cards and student teaching internationally because he could. He had a place to fall back to;\u00a0I did not.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:26]\u00a0I only had myself to fall back on, so I made sure I maintained that, my savings myself. Because who else is going to support me but me? But him, he is like, I can just go back home. I married a grasshopper. This is what happens when the grasshopper marries the ant. So the thing is though, and Bill Perkins thing is like, when does the ant get to play? So that\u2019s my question. When does the ant get to play? So I lost decades. He did not.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:57]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Are you saying you worked so hard in your 20s and you saved up a bunch of money and Ryan did not? It sounds like he went out a lot and bought some bikes and stuff like that. Now you two are married and you\u2019re resentful of that. Is that what I\u2019m hearing?<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:15]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0100%. Because he got to live his happy grasshopper life. Where I had to constantly work and store and make sure\u2013 and I feel like we are set up, not to say he didn\u2019t have a part in how we\u2019re set up now because he was obviously a huge piece for that, but he got to end up here, even existing as a grasshopper then. I got here because I worked consistently to make sure I got here.<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:47]\u00a0And I actually had my eyes on here, whereas he was not looking ahead that far. He was looking a couple of blocks ahead, whereas I was looking decades ahead, and he still ended up in the same place as me. I 100%feel resentment over that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:03]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Hmm. What do you think about that, Ryan?<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:08]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0I can understand the resentment. It\u2019s upsetting to me that she didn\u2019t get to experience a lot of the stuff that I did get to experience as I was living that grasshopper life.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:30]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I planned to the porch and the rocking chair, older retirement. I don\u2019t really have a handle or a vision for the right now. I feel like the goalpost needs to be moved a little bit more and I don\u2019t know where to put it for that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:49]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I think in order to speak on this, I need to look at your numbers with you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:56]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Assets are $584,836. Investments are $467,985. Savings is $135,249. And debt is $218,135.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:19]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Total net worth?<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:20]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0For a total net worth of 969,935 bucks.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:26]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, great. How do you feel about that number?<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:28]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Not going to lie, when I saw the net worth, I was a little giddy.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:34]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Interesting, right? Worrying about money almost every day. Probably had not added up a net worth before. What do you think about that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:41]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Not a net worth. I had never done that before.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm. Okay. All right. Ryan, let\u2019s go ahead and talk about gross monthly income. Can you read that combined income right there?<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:55]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a011, 815.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:57]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I think it\u2019s six.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:58]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Cool. Yeah. 11, 615. Sorry.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right, so that\u2019s $139,380. Did you all know that that\u2019s what you made?<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:05]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:05]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0No.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:07]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0There we go, 50%, what I tell you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:09]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I hate being part of the majority.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:15]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What was it like doing the CSP together?<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:17]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh my God, I loved it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:19]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, it was a lot of fun.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:21]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I was like spreadsheets, spreadsheets.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:23]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Michelle, I know loved it. Ryan, did you like it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:26]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, yeah. It was really interesting.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:27]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wow. So how long did it take you to do this together?<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:31]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Multiple sessions because we\u2013 I don\u2019t know if you can tell them a little on the thorough side.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:36]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I just need to cut in here to point out that Michelle spent several minutes describing her emotional and even physical reactions to worrying about money, which she does constantly.\u00a0And she even said she loves spreadsheets and obviously spends a lot of time in them, but she has never actually calculated her net worth.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:56]\u00a0This is so common. People play small with money all the time. They think that managing money means paying bills. They agonize over a $50 Target bill. They log into their apps every day, and they spend years, even decades, doing this,\u00a0basically moving meaningless puzzle pieces around the board.<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:18]\u00a0The\u00a0truth is that most of this is pointless. Tracking the price of your family spending on fruit roll-ups is pointless, and so is logging into your financial apps every single\u00a0week or day to make sure that your bill got paid on time. What really matters is not these 3-dollar questions, but the $30,000 questions, like, what\u2019s our net worth? Are we hitting our four numbers in the conscious spending plan? When will our debt be paid off? When will we have a million dollars? When will we have enough to retire?\u00a0And on and on.<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:48]\u00a0Guys, I want you to play big with money, not small. That\u2019s why I do this podcast. And for those of you who want to do this together with your partner, go and pre-order my upcoming book, Money for Couples. You can get it from Amazon, Barnes &amp; Noble, or the indies via bookshop.org.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:05]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m currently staying home with the kids.<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:08]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Ah, okay. How long have you been doing that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:10]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Since 2016.<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:12]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right. So let\u2019s take a look here. So your net is 8,130 bucks. Michelle, can you read this number to me? Fixed costs, what is this number here, the percentage?<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:26]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0That is 113%.<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:29]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So I\u2019m confused guys. How is it possible that you have these conversations about money and transfer and you assured me that credit card gets paid every month and all this stuff is fine, but you are losing money every single month?<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:49]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, so we talked about this. I had just as much upset as you when I saw that percentage. But it really didn\u2019t hit me until that one credit card bill where it matched the income for the month. So it\u2019s not a frequent thing. It\u2019s not an expected thing, but it has happened a handful of times over those seven years.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:12]\u00a0And it\u2019s just worked. It doesn\u2019t look like it should work. We mapped this out on paper before I resigned, and we were in the red. And there\u2019s some stuff that just dropped off once I stopped working, and it just worked. We were actually ahead each month for a while.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:31]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And then?<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:32]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0And now we\u2019re not.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You are losing money every single month. You\u2019re broke. You are broke, both of you. It is clear as day. And you\u2019re saying, well, somehow it works out. It\u2019s not working. It just hasn\u2019t caught up to you yet. Simple as that. This is why I wanted to look at the CSP early.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:03]\u00a0Guys, the way you\u2019re talking about money, I can see that you\u2019re discontent with money and with the way you both look at each other, but you have a fire burning in your house. You\u2019re losing money every single month. So do you see the severity of the situation?<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:24]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, it can\u2019t continue because it\u2019ll keep chipping away into that savings. That\u2019s not going to be able to float us forever.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:37]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s not the way you want to go through life, especially with young children. Michelle, what\u2019s your reaction?<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:48]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0My reaction to it is I know that that number is why I feel the way I do day to day. I\u2019m comfortable here. I\u2019ve lived here my whole life.<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:02]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Comfortable in?<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:04]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0In this stress. I know that it\u2019s possible to come out on the other end of it. In my mind, the way that I justified it, and I still do, is that it\u2019s temporary. The goal that I had in mind was to keep a float, was to stay even. I built up that savings for this so that if we got to this point, which we\u2019re now in, that I\u2019d have a little bit of time\u2013 I don\u2019t know exactly how much time, but I\u2019d have a little bit of time where it could soften the blow and keep the fire burning lower, or at least so that I could survive it until I get to the other side.<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:53]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Why are you talking like this? First of all, it sounds like we\u2019re on Game of Thrones or something. What the hell is happening?<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:59]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0In my mind, it was a temporary\u2013 and this was how I looked at it in my 20s too.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:03]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, but 20 years later you\u2019re in your early 40s.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:05]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I know. I\u2019m still here.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:08]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0This is a crisis. What is going through your head when you see 113% going towards fixed costs?<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:17]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0That it\u2019s not sustainable. I don\u2019t have a timeline on that, but I know that it\u2019s not sustainable, that we cannot exist this way.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What\u2019s going to happen?<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:27]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0We will actually be broke, as in savings will be eaten away to nothing.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Correct. You\u2019ll run out of money.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:35]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:36]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Ryan, what do you think my perspective is?<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:38]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s a sinking ship. It can\u2019t continue this way because we will run out of money. It\u2019s the numbers. That\u2019s what the numbers are. They don\u2019t lie.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:53]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Is it working?<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:59]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0No. Look at the spreadsheet. It\u2019s not working.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:04]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s take a look at the numbers line by line, shall we? So your housing costs are 24%. It\u2019s pretty good for a family of five. All right, moving along. Target, 763. What is this?<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:21]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. So I had to put separate line items because I don\u2019t sit and take all the Target and the Amazon stuff. The groceries is easy because it\u2019s specific stores, but for Target and Amazon, I get some groceries from Target. I get some birthday gifts from Target. Target covers a whole bunch of line items in one, so I gave it its own line item. Amazon is diapers too. There\u2019s all sorts of stuff. Some people count diapers and groceries, but like\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:51]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Michelle, you know that that\u2019s a very unsatisfying answer, right?<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:55]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, I do.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:57]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And we haven\u2019t even gotten to Amazon yet.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:59]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0No.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, let\u2019s talk about Amazon. What\u2019s that number there?<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:03]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0That upset me. 1,185 bucks.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:05]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What is that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:07]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I was upset about that one, you remember, Ryan? I have the household subscriptions like diapers and vitamins, whatever. So I have that all on my side. I was like, what is yours doing at\u2013 what was yours? Yours was at least 500 of that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:21]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s 500 a month. It averaged out to be that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:23]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m like what are you buying $500 a month on Amazon? That one was a surprise.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Pull up your Amazon account. Let\u2019s just look at the last few orders.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:33]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0It was a pair of sunglasses for my son that had gotten broken. $13 for the sunglasses. We signed the kids up for soccer. Here\u2019s $25 for the shin guards and the soccer ball. There\u2019s four pairs of shoes with the intention of returning three of them.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:49]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:49]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0One is 18. One is 38. One was 23. One was 18.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right, keep going.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:55]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0$21 for the bike tires. A replacement part for the refrigerator that broke. I think that was $17. Little paper cups for the bathroom. They were $16.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:10]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0This one is water shoes, kids\u2019, 13 bucks. Baby wipes, 40 bucks. Vitamins for the kids. That one\u2019s 32 bucks. Shampoo for the kids. That one\u2019s 11 bucks.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:26]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Guys, you don\u2019t get to $1,000 a month on $13 sunglass purchases.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:33]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, it\u2019s a lot of just nickel and diming. So it was $49 for a gas detector, $90 for a beach canopy for the summer, for going to the beach to create shade. A pair of sneakers for me. That was about 100 bucks.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Guys?<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:50]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m scrolling through. Nothing else is higher than that on my end, really.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:56]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So what do you think\u2019s going on here?<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:58]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0We\u2019re impulsively buying things let\u2019s say that we don\u2019t really need.<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:04]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I knew the Amazon on my end because it\u2019s a subscription for house things. I was very surprised on his end. So we did fine tooth comb this. We really did. And it really was a ton of little things. It really is death by 1,000 paper cuts on the Amazon front.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:23]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You can hear that they jumped right down into the weeds. Of course, I did ask them to list out some of their purchases, but when I asked them to zoom up and to explain what they think is going on here, they play the innocent doe technique. Me? Little old me? I have no idea what\u2019s going on here. Now, listen, I can understand not knowing where a few hundred bucks a month go, but $2,000 a month in unexplained charges from Target and Amazon? There\u2019s something else going on here.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s not just Target, which is $763 a month. It\u2019s not just Amazon, which is $1,185 a month. It\u2019s not just groceries with the $1,230. We also then have kids\u2019 activities, which is 955 additional dollars per month. If I spoke to your kids and I asked them, you\u2019re young. What do your parents say about money? What would they say?<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:18]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t say, we don\u2019t have the money. We can\u2019t afford it. I don\u2019t say those things. I say, I would rather spend my money on\u2013 we have this frequently with the ice cream man.<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:27]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What else, Ryan?<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:30]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0I want to think I tend to say, all right, we\u2019ll try and figure this out type of thing. In terms of let\u2019s say the ice cream man, I\u2019m a little bit more of the yes person for that. But let\u2019s say we got some donuts, Dunkin Donuts, and afterwards they wanted the ice cream man. I was like, no, we just got that. We can\u2019t also get the ice cream man.<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:56]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u2019re going into debt, and we\u2019re sitting here talking about Dunkin Donuts? Are we being honest right now? Because I always say to live a Rich Life, you got to be honest, honest with yourselves and honest with the people around you. I think if I asked your kids, what do mom and dad say, they would say, dad says we\u2019re going to try to figure it out. Mom worries about money, things like, how are we going to pay for this? Or, oh, it\u2019s the end of the month.<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:20]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0They hear me get upset with Ryan, I would say.<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:24]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Ah. What do they hear you say?<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:26]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Why are you buying two separate slices of pizza for whatever it was, $14, when we just bought a 24-dollar pie. We took them to a little kitty show, and I was sick that day, so I ended up not being able to go. And Ryan went alone, which means the police officer wasn\u2019t there. And of course, what\u2019s the first thing I did?<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:49]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Sorry. Are you the police officer?<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:51]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I am the no officer. I am the limitation officer. Let\u2019s put it that way. So my card pings my phone when there\u2019s a charge over $200. So I wouldn\u2019t say I was actively checking, but it pinged my phone for a charge over $200. I\u2019m like, oh, that\u2019s weird. I look at it and it says it\u2019s the venue. He bought over $200 worth of merch after already spending $250 on the tickets for the show. He bought $250 worth of merch while there because they wanted it. As you can imagine, I was not okay with that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:30]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Is the issue really just that, Ryan, you\u2019re just overspending on the kids and we should just stop? Is that it? I think we could go the next five years pointing fingers at each other and it wouldn\u2019t get us anywhere.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:41]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Ryan and Michelle are doing something that is so common for lots of couples. They\u2019re living their lives day to day, and once in a while they pay attention to money, but it\u2019s always when something goes wrong. And during that moment, they get so frustrated that they try to make a change.<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:56]\u00a0But the problem is they don\u2019t have a shared vision. They don\u2019t talk about money regularly or proactively. They see money completely differently, which leads them to adopt these very peculiar roles like Michelle calling herself the family\u2019s police officer of spending. But most of all, the changes they try to make are one-time episodic changes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:18]\u00a0There\u2019s no true lifestyle change, no systems, and therefore no sustainable change. It would be like you\u2019re in a lake, you\u2019re starting to drown, so you paddle for a few seconds, and then you go right back underwater, and eventually you drown because you never learned the really important part here, which is how to swim.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:41]\u00a0Obviously, this goes a lot deeper than $13 sunglasses.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:44]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Have you ever said no to your kids? Like, we just can\u2019t do that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:51]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s how I grew up. I never did the gymnastics. I never did the swimming lessons. The money was just not there. We took the calculator to the grocery store. We heated up some Ellio\u2019s pizza. We did all the extracurriculars that school had to offer because those were free.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:12]\u00a0I wanted to be able to give them the chance to do that stuff. I took them to the trial gymnastics class. I took them to the trial swim class, and we never stopped it. It never stopped.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:26]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0If you had to pick one and drop everything else, those are the two that they would want to keep. So those are the two that I want to try to keep for them.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:38]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0Problem is, though, I have played with that spreadsheet. No matter what I did, I didn\u2019t get it below 75%, even dropping stuff entirely.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What does that tell you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:51]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I mean, I would think it\u2019s an income problem.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Well, every couple who overspends thinks it\u2019s an income problem. If you two started making $250,000 a year, you\u2019d run through every last cent of it right now.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:02]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0There\u2019s no site beyond what we have now.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:06]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Saying what?<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:07]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0This is it. And this is where we exist. This is where we are stuck. I use that word a lot with Ryan, actually. We are stuck. This is where we are stuck. He bought a starter house. We will retire in the same house that we started in because we\u2019re stuck. We are stuck with everything that we currently have. We stopped dreaming. You can\u2019t dream at 113%. You can\u2019t. You just can\u2019t. So we don\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:37]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0I definitely feel stuck. I\u2019m going to say most days I\u2019m just trying to survive. I\u2019m trying to juggle the 9,000 things that all have to be handled on a daily basis between everything. Vision of the future, would love one. I\u2019m trying to get through tonight, so it gets tough to get out of that mindset.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Often offer people the ability to make no changes, minor changes, or big changes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:19]\u00a0<strong>Ryan:<\/strong>\u00a0I think big changes need to be made. I think I\u2019m a little afraid to make them, but I think they need to be made.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:26]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Michelle?<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:30]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0I think I\u2019d have to see what they entail before I can choose what I\u2019d be on board with.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:40]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What big changes could I suggest that you would be against?<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:49]\u00a0<strong>Michelle:<\/strong>\u00a0You watch this from the other side, and it\u2019s just so obvious. I\u2019m flashing back to being 24 years old and throwing popcorn at the TV with Suze Orman while I have the kids I\u2019m babysitting for sleeping on the couch next to me because, of course, I\u2019m earning money. Of course, you can\u2019t afford that. You\u2019re not fully funding your Roth IRA. And here I am on the other side not wanting to let go of some vitamins.<\/p>\n<p>[00:41:17]\u00a0I\u2019d have to see what it is first because I want my kids to remember. I remember thinking like, I really wanted to try gymnastics and I couldn\u2019t do it. And I want them to be able to do it. I know. I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n<p>[00:41:52]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Hearing both of you answer my question is painful because I can see your future clearer in some ways than you can see it. I know what it means when you have 113% fixed costs. It\u2019s like catastrophe. You just so far haven\u2019t yet experienced the earthquake that is coming your way.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:18]\u00a0Most people don\u2019t know their fixed cost number, but even among those who do, when they discover that they\u2019re overspending, they usually get this vague feeling like they\u2019re doing something wrong. It goes something like, oh, no, this is supposed to be 50 to 60%, but we\u2019re at 113%, and that\u2019s bad.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:38]\u00a0And that\u2019s as far as it goes. This is where you really see that human nature is not quite as rational as you were brought up to believe. I guarantee that if Michelle and Ryan saw their son get a paper cut, they would react with more urgency than realizing they have 113% fixed cost. In other words, that they are spending more than they make every single month.<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:00]\u00a0Now, I\u2019m not blaming them. In fact, we are all irrational like this in some part of our life, but this is a slow-moving train wreck that will happen. See, money is complex. It\u2019s not as simple as, oh, I\u2019m doing well because I have $10,000 in my checking account, or I\u2019m doing horribly because we\u2019re down to $27.<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:21]\u00a0That\u2019s not how it works. Money is complex. You can actually be losing money every single month and not realize it for months or in some cases years, but eventually it will catch up with you. And when that happens, it gets bad. It gets very, very bad.<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:36]\u00a0You don\u2019t hear many stories about couples in those situations,\u00a0the ones who spent more than they made over and over for months and months. You know why? That\u2019s because the people who lose their house and sometimes lose their family don\u2019t want to talk about it, and sometimes they can\u2019t talk about it because they now have to work two jobs just to keep the lights on.<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:56]\u00a0I don\u2019t want this for you. That\u2019s why I created my conscious spending plan,\u00a0so you can see where your numbers are today, and it\u2019s free. And that\u2019s why I created my book. You can get it from the library or any bookstore so that you can set up your automatic money systems and save and invest and spend on the things you love. That is what I want for you, to go on offense with your\u00a0money. Next week we\u2019ll continue this conversation with Michelle and Ryan, and I promise you you\u2019re going to be surprised. I will see you then.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Michelle is 42, Ryan is 43. They\u2019ve been married for 9 years and share two young children. Michelle worries about money; she always has. Ryan knows they\u2019re in trouble, but can\u2019t say no to their kids. On one income, spending outpaces earning\u2014slowly draining their savings and weighing them down with dread over the future. This [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[290],"class_list":["post-118869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-podcast-episodes"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"modified_by":"Nasrin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118869","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118869"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118869\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118869"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118869"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}