<\/p>\n
<\/iframe><span data-mce-type=\"bookmark\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border-radius: 12px;\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/episode\/1pcLG7oyRINXBzviouziGC?utm_source=generator\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Vanessa (48) and George (59) have been married for five years and run two businesses together, but still keep their finances separate, leading to recurring tension, resentment, and financial instability.<\/p>\n<p>Vanessa is a risk-tolerant entrepreneur who sees money as a tool for growth. George is nearing retirement, risk-averse, and clings to financial security. They split everything 50\/50, even when Vanessa stopped drawing a paycheck from their business. Now, with $482K in debt and $28K in savings, George\u2019s retirement is looming, making their financial foundation feel unstable. His fear-based money spirals derail productive conversations, while Vanessa feels alone, unsupported, and afraid their misalignment could threaten their future.<\/p>\n<p>Can they learn to trust each other, merge their financial lives, and build a shared vision before retirement kicks in?<\/p>\n<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_82_2 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-grey ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<div class=\"ez-toc-title-container\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Turinys:<\/p>\n<span class=\"ez-toc-title-toggle\"><a href=\"#\" class=\"ez-toc-pull-right ez-toc-btn ez-toc-btn-xs ez-toc-btn-default ez-toc-toggle\" aria-label=\"Toggle Table of Content\"><span class=\"ez-toc-js-icon-con\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-4' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-4'><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-4' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-4'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/2025\/06\/21\/episode-212-hes-terrified-of-losing-it-all-so-shes-losing-him\/#This_episode_is_brought_to_you_by\" >This episode is brought to you by:<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/2025\/06\/21\/episode-212-hes-terrified-of-losing-it-all-so-shes-losing-him\/#Links_mentioned_in_this_episode\" >Links mentioned in this episode\u00a0<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/2025\/06\/21\/episode-212-hes-terrified-of-losing-it-all-so-shes-losing-him\/#Transcript\" >Transcript\u00a0<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<h4><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"This_episode_is_brought_to_you_by\"><\/span><b>This episode is brought to you by:<\/b><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h4>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\">Factor | Get 50% off plus free shipping on your first box at <\/span><strong>https:\/\/factormeals.com\/ramit50off<\/strong><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\"> with code RAMIT50OFF.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\">Rocket Money | Stop throwing your money away. Cancel unwanted subscriptions \u2013 and manage your expenses the easy way \u2013 by going to <\/span><strong>https:\/\/rocketmoney.com\/ramit<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\">Masterclass | For unlimited access to every class and 15% off an annual membership, go to <\/span><strong>https:\/\/masterclass.com\/ramit<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\">Trust & Will | Protect what matters most in minutes at <\/span><strong>https:\/\/trustandwill.com\/ramit<\/strong><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\"> and get 10% off plus free shipping.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\">LMNT | Right now, LMNT is offering 8 single serving packets FREE with any LMNT order. This is a great way to try LMNT\u2019s most popular flavors. Get yours at <\/span><strong>https:\/\/drinklmnt.com\/RAMIT<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h2 aria-level=\"2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Links_mentioned_in_this_episode\"><\/span><b><span data-contrast=\"none\">Links mentioned in this episode<\/span><\/b><span data-ccp-props=\"{"134233117":false,"134233118":false,"134245418":true,"134245529":true,"201341983":0,"335559685":0,"335559737":450,"335559738":0,"335559739":0,"335559740":768}\">\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 300;\">Order my new book: Money for Couples<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 aria-level=\"2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Transcript\"><\/span><b><span data-contrast=\"none\">Transcript<\/span><\/b><span data-ccp-props=\"{"134233117":false,"134233118":false,"134245418":true,"134245529":true,"201341983":0,"335559685":2010,"335559737":2010,"335559738":375,"335559739":375,"335559740":768}\">\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"none\">Download the full transcript PDF<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{"134233117":false,"134233118":false,"335559685":2010,"335559737":2010,"335559738":150,"335559739":150}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">How come you trust me with all of the business money, but it doesn’t seem like you feel the same way about our personal money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think with the business is there is protection in place. With personal money, there’s not. That’s probably what it comes down to, security. I’m feeling secure about money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s like pulling teeth to get him to want to talk about this stuff as if I’m on my own.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:18)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0But there still is a bit of me that has that fear. I still have this anxiety about it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It did make me feel immediately distrusted. I hear panic. I hear a lot of fear.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:27)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0My fear is driving my decision making.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:30)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I had left my last marriage with absolutely nothing. I had no money, nowhere to live, no vehicle.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I get really, really uncomfortable with that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Asking for help is not something I’m good at.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:41)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don’t want to wait till I’m 70 to figure this out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I have to keep track of how much I owe him, and he doesn’t keep track of it. He says, „I don’t know how much you owe me.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Vanessa–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:47)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I feel like I have to do all the work.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:48)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Does it work?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:00:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I’m about to speak to Vanessa and George. Vanessa’s 48. George is 59. They own two businesses together, and they have been married for five years. But interestingly, they have not combined their personal finances.\u00a0I’m looking at their conscious spending plan. You can also download your own template for free at iwt.com\/csp.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:01:02)\u00a0Looking at the numbers, they earn roughly $200,000 combined. Their assets are listed at $3.4 million. I’m curious to learn about that. What’s interesting is that their investments here are just $157,000, which in their late\u00a040s\u00a0and\u00a050s, I would expect that number to be much higher, especially given their income.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:01:25)\u00a0And their debt is $478,000.\u00a0Fixed costs are 46%, quite low.\u00a0Investments, 10%.\u00a0Savings, 9%.\u00a0Guilt-free spending,\u00a035%. Honestly, I don’t have a lot of comments on their spending right now, although I am a little bit puzzled by their net worth number.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:01:46)\u00a0What caught my\u00a0eye\u00a0about this couple was Vanessa’s application. First off, it’s four pages long, and I noticed that she goes off in a lot of tangents, but the words that she uses in her application are extremely emotionally charged.\u00a0Listen as I read her some of the most vivid lines from her own application.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Interview)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:02:07)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Vanessa, on your application you wrote, „George has emotional spiral attacks rooted in fear. I regularly have to talk him down off the edge. His white-knuckled, death grip on money makes feel super isolated and lonely. We co-own two businesses, but our differing views on money might drive us apart, which I do not want.” What do you hear as you hear me read back your own words to you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:02:40)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I hear panic. I hear a lot of fear.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:02:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And George, had you seen this application before?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:02:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, but when it’s read out by you, it has a different impact for sure.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:02:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What kind of impact?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:02:51)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Makes me realize that my behavior when it comes to money is something that I definitely want to work on. It’s like, oh, I’ve got some room to improve there. I need to grow in that area because that’s not a really comfortable place for my spouse and partner, my business partner and life partner to be. How can we grow? How can we build our \u200aRich Life when there’s that difference? I would hate to be her because if she’s on pins and needles all the time, it’s really hard to confide and grow in business and together.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:03:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. That’s a pretty mature perspective on hearing those words. I appreciate that. Vanessa, you further wrote, „Due to cash flow issues in one of our companies, I wasn’t taking a wage for about eight months last year, but I was still paying 50% of our expenses. I racked up over $8,000 in credit card debt just to keep up. When I asked George to help pay it off, he asked if I’d be paying him back. When I said no, he was clearly not interested.” What do you make of that, Vanessa?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:03:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I felt like the debt was incurred to maintain our life between the businesses and our living expenses, but that I was on my own to pay it back.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:03:58)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Let me get a full understanding of the financial situation here. So I understand you both co-own two businesses, is that correct?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:07)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes. We’re a Canadian-owned C corp, operating in Alaska in Skagway.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:13)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It is a design brand. And the one product line that we’re best known for is our jewelry, which is made with wild fur that George traps on his trap line.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:20)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And George, are you a member of an indigenous– how do I say it correctly, tribe?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. I’m a member of Teslin Tlingit Council, which is the First Nations within the territory of the Yukon. My great-grandfather found his wealth trapping, and he’s handed that down to me, and it’s a beautiful way of life being out on the land. And that’s what’s one of the foundations of the businesses is.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:41)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, great. Do you two get along in business?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And can you just clarify for me,\u00a0how are each of the businesses doing, financially speaking?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:04:51)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So the Canadian business is not currently profitable. We’ve experienced a lot of dumb things with the local government that’s had really negative impacts on the business’s performance. The revenue dropped 94% after the municipality did something stupid. So we’ve been trying to claw our way back from that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:05:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Not profitable. That’s all I need to know.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:05:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0The Alaska company is doing fantastic. The magic was when both Vanessa and I showed up in the store. We launched a new product last year, so I feel really good about that store, but not willing to let The Whitehorse, the flagship store go neither.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:05:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. Profitable business, unprofitable business.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:05:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And there’s 1,000 reasons. Like the Canadian company, we–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:05:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s okay. That’s okay. I don’t need to know all the reasons. I just need to know the status. Okay, so you two are married. You co-own two businesses together. Why do you keep your money separate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:05:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don’t know. George, why do we keep our money separate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:05:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Recently we just opened some joint accounts. Not sure. I’d like to get to the root of that as well.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wait, what? Nobody knows?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, know. I know.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Everybody sitting in this room? What? Okay, hold on. Wait, did you say you know, Vanessa?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. I’ve asked George for a long time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0If you know, then just out of curiosity, how come you asked him in the way that you did? I read it as passive aggressive. I don’t know. George, you tell us.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think the reason that I’d handed it back to him, the hot potato, was that I am very clear on why I want to combine finances, and this is a tired topic, and I wanted him to say the words because I don’t feel like historically he’d really taken ownership for his fear-based relationship with the money situation in our marriage.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. That, I appreciate. You know what, if we’re going to have a long conversation today, let’s be direct with each other. How about that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:06:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So George, would you be willing to pick up what Vanessa tossed out? She said you clearly have a reason why you have not combined finances. A minute ago, you said, I don’t know. Sounds like maybe you do know.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:07:09)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s a tough one because there is really no good reason other than it’s rooted in probably some insecurities around money. This is where that thinking part comes in. It’s like, how do I attack that, and how do I think about that? Trust, possibly.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:07:21)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can we take it back? When was the first time that the two of you talked about potentially combining money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:07:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I remember a conversation in the first year or two that we were dating. I was in the process of exiting my former marriage that was a long and expensive and dramatic divorce, and so George got to see how that was affecting me and it led us to having a conversation around prenups. He brought it up.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:07:45)\u00a0But at that time, I had left my last marriage with absolutely nothing. I had no money, nowhere to live, no vehicle. Even my kids had stayed behind with my ex because I had to get out for safety reasons. And so George saw me with literally nothing. And so him asking me about the prenup, it made me feel a little uncomfortable because I wasn’t familiar with what that really entailed, but\u00a0it did make me feel immediately distrusted.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:08:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Did you know that, George?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:08:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, I think I was aware of all of those different things that were going on, for sure.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:08:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So it sounds like the first time you talked about money early on, there were some legitimate reasons to talk about money, prenups, not having anything. I totally get that. I really respect that the two of you talked about it openly early on. It’s awesome. What about once you got married? Did you have conversations about combining finances?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:08:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We had several that really just made not a lot of progress. I would bring, not the, conversation up, but the idea within whatever conversation was already happening, whether it was about, oh, send me the money for the whatever repair or the renovation. I would see that as an opportunity to introduce this idea of like, well, this could be a lot simpler if we had just streamlined everything and we at least had a joint account just for running our life together. And that just would never, ever get any progress.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:09:07)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What would you say, George, when she brought it up?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:09:09)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I felt like, oh, that’s your idea. And so I really struggled with it, going, „That’s your idea. This is what you want us to do as a couple.” But then when we started reading your book and I started listening to some of your podcasts, it was like, oh, actually I’m hearing it from another source.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:09:23)\u00a0And that gave a neutral third party some direction for both of us to take. And I immediately started feeling better. Now, it hasn’t been instantaneous. We’re slowly, and we’re still working. When did we set up our joint accounts? Two weeks ago?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:09:37)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0A week ago. Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:09:37)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0A week ago.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:09:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So you guys are cleaning the house before the house cleaner comes. This happens all the time, by the way.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:09:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0This is classic. People come on the show with huge financial challenges, 10 out of 10,\u00a0and then like magic,\u00a0the week before we talk, they suddenly open up a joint account or they pay off their loans. They figure it all out. This is exactly like cleaning your house before the house cleaner arrives.\u00a0It actually makes no sense.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:10:04)\u00a0It’s a way to often calm your own anxiety because you know that somebody is about to shine a light on how you’ve been living. It’s also a sign of avoidance. My guests know that their finances are going to be talked about, so they’re scrambling to tidy things up just enough to avoid the real conversation of how they got there in the first place.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Interview)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:10:27)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I’m curious. Vanessa mentions to you, „Hey, it would be easier if we had a joint account.” And at the time she was your wife. And your response was, „That’s not my idea.” But then when you heard me, a random guy on the radio say like, „Hey, combining accounts is good,” why’d you trust me more than your wife?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:10:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s a really good question. I think there’s a lot of fear-based thinking around money and security, and you hear all the stories, losing everything kind of thing, and it doesn’t matter if it’s in a relationship or not, it’s just that fear of losing everything and not being able to provide for yourself.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:11:07)\u00a0And you watch other couples struggle with this and having to start over and being taken advantage of. And I think there’s just a lot of fear around what could happen to you. I’m not in a position where I’ve got huge savings, but what I do have, I feel like that’ll sustain me and my retirement.\u00a0But now that I’m married, it’s like, okay, let’s take and build something else to sustain both of us. And I think it just took me a while to switch from that me mindset and my money to us and our money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:11:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. I appreciate that. Vanessa, any reactions as you hear George describe the recent changes?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:11:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What’s interesting is this scenario that\u00a0I heard him mention as being the thing he’s afraid of is what he was literally watching me come out of. My ex-husband was abusive and toxic and narcissistic,\u00a0and he controlled the\u00a0money and was a whole situation.\u00a0And I left there with just my few possessions. And he watched me get tricked out of all the money. And he was watching me experience this thing that he was afraid of.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:12:13)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What she was going through was horrible, and I’d never want to go through that. I’d never want to put her through it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:12:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. That’s interesting. I’d never want to go through it. I’d never want to put her through it. And so your conclusion was, therefore I’m going to just keep things the way they were when I was single, when I, George, was single. I’m not going to combine income. I’m just going to freeze in time even though we’re married. Is that an accurate representation of basically what you did with your money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:12:37)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think that is what I did with my money, yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:12:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Vanessa, what is it like for you building a business with your husband but not sharing your personal money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:12:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It seems a bit silly. We have so much money invested of our own personal money into both of them. And he obviously trusts me in that context. I’m just not clear on what’s taken so long for him to feel like he can maybe trust me a little bit now to have these brand new joint accounts, where the disparity comes from.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You ever ask him?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can we do it right now?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:16)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. Hey, George. How come you trust me with all of the business money but it doesn’t seem like you feel the same way about our personal money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:24)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think with the businesses, there’s protections in place. With personal money, there’s not. That’s probably what it comes down to, security or feeling secure about money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:32)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Did that answer your question, Vanessa?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. I assume that happens a lot, right?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. It’s a little bit tiring. This is usually the part where I go, „Okay, you’re not ready to talk about it. I’ll wait till another time.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What do you do when you ask a question and don’t get a definitive answer? Do you double down? Do you yell? Do you leave? Do you change the subject? Do you say, „Okay?”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:13:54)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think I often will just give up and wait till another time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. How do you give up? What do you say?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don’t even say anything. I think I just let the conversation take a pause and then we just move on like I never brought it up.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I usually exit, and then she follows me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:13)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You leave the room and then, Vanessa, you follow? And what do you like, watch TV or something?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Sometimes. He’ll usually go into the basement to sit by the wood stove.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:22)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0First of all, this sounds very Canadian. The fact that I’m going to a wood stove. What do you do, Vanessa? Cuddle up and pretend it didn’t happen?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0If his reaction has been that strong where he feels like he just is shutting down and needs to walk away, if I follow him, I will usually follow up with something that’s gentle and to soothe any of his feelings of distress so that it’s not going to harm the relationship because I want to make sure that the conversations can happen in a safe way without it doing any damage to one another.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:14:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Understood. And can I just ask one final question? Do you ever bring it up and get a satisfactory answer?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:15:01)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Sometimes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:15:02)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. That’s good.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:15:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0But with bigger stuff that requires more commitment, the setting up of the joint accounts definitely is a harder ask.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:15:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What we just saw is one of the most common dynamics that I see in couples, the chaser-avoider dynamic.\u00a0Vanessa is obviously the chaser. She’s desperate for some kind of participation in their finances so that she doesn’t feel like she’s doing this alone.\u00a0And she tries everything. She brings it up nicely. She picks a different time of day. She even changes her tone.\u00a0But none of it works.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:15:34)\u00a0George, the avoider,\u00a0shuts it down. He actually physically leaves the room, and that dynamic is painfully familiar. The more she chases, the more he avoids.\u00a0What’s happening here is not just miscommunication.\u00a0It’s a cycle, and it’s been reinforced,\u00a0concretized over the years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:15:56)\u00a0The important thing to understand is that this dynamic is co-created. Vanessa’s not chasing because she wants to. She’s chasing because she’s embedded in this dynamic with George. Think about it. Chasing gives her a sense of control, of meaning, even if the chasing doesn’t work.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:16:17)\u00a0And George avoids,\u00a0not just out of malice.\u00a0He’s doing what he’s always done to manage discomfort.\u00a0And guess what? She takes over,\u00a0makes it all right. You can see this dynamic in play. If he can begin to see the toll that this takes on her and on their relationship, that could be the first real step towards breaking this pattern.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:16:39)\u00a0We’re\u00a0going to\u00a0get right into that after the break.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Interview)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:16:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think one thing that has shifted is Vanessa’s able to show me graphs of where our businesses are at, what they’re doing, able to show our personal life where they’re at, so I can see things. Whereas before it was like, I feel like we should do this. Whereas now if she shows me something that’s tangible, that makes more sense to me, which really helps me with my trust issues around money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:17:04)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I appreciate that. I do have to ask a question though, George. Do you think it gets tiring for her to have to jump through 50 different hoops to find a way to convince her husband to do something?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:17:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes, absolutely. It must be very frustrating.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:17:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Kind of feels to me like I would be going through my relationship, just trying to get through the day. There’s a million things that have to happen in a relationship, and with everything I have to fight a battle pushing a stone up a hill instead of it being easy and just blending, working beautifully with my partner. Do you see the difference?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:17:37)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:17:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Do you have that in one part of your relationship where it’s just easy, it’s fluid?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:17:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Most of the rest of it. Just the way that we work together in our business. When we’re out on the sales floor together, we can just lob the conversations back and forth. I’ll talk about a product. He’ll talk about a product, and we know the pitch up, down, inside, out, and it’s just like cartwheels and high fives, and it’s just like a fine, well-oiled machine.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:02)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I like that. George, you agree with that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:04)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely. We’re dynamic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s beautiful. It’s like you described a well-oiled machine. Sometimes I call it a ballet. It’s just everybody is doing their part and you know you have a teammate. You don’t even have to look. You know they’re right there doing exactly what you know they’re doing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:20)\u00a0That’s what we want to do with money, so that if there’s a question about spending, you already know 98% of the time what they’re going to say or do. You’ve already set up a bunch of guidelines so that there’s no question. And then once in a while, you’re not sure. You just talk. You check in, and it feels good. That’s where we’re going to get with money if everything goes well today. How’s that sound?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, that sounds–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I already feel less tired at the thought of that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes, there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and you know it because you already do it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:18:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Vanessa and George clearly know how to communicate well in other areas of life, which is quite surprising given how they talk about money. George avoids. We haven’t yet gotten to the why, and I know there’s something deeper going on here. Maybe it’s out of fear.\u00a0Maybe it’s ignorance.\u00a0Maybe he avoids because he is embarrassed. He doesn’t understand money.\u00a0But there’s always a reason that people avoid money. Listen, as I press him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Interview)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:19:21)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can you think of a time you were scared or nervous of money since you’ve been married to Vanessa?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:19:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Those come quite more frequently for me than her. The tariffs is a big scary thing to go through– those types of things. With Whitehorse store, when it took a downturn a few years ago, that was scary because we’re still growing the Alaska business. I’m still working halftime.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:19:42)\u00a0So counting on my half-year wage to fund those businesses to keep them going. So those are times where I feel like I wish I had more support systems in place to understand this better. Because a lot of times I admit that sometimes it’s just understanding.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:19:56)\u00a0Because there’s the fear-based thinking and then there’s actually what’s happening. So Vanessa said something to me recently that really helped calm me. And she talked about the money being like the tide. And she said, „Right now the tide’s out.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:09)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And now it’s starting to come back in. In the last few months we’ve noticed a tide coming back in. So there is things that are changing and shifting. So it’s helped me to grapple with the, holy (Bleep), the tide’s out right now. We’re all going to die. I have to go back to work full time. I’m not going to be able to retire. I’m not going to have enough in retirement.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:24)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0When was the last time you read a book on money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:27)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It would’ve been yours last year.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You read my book last year? Hey, that’s better than 95% of the people who come on this show. So already you’re ahead of the game. Out of curiosity, you’re, I believe, 59 years old. Correct?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:41)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:41)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And I’m assuming, correct me if I’m wrong, you’ve been worried about money for a long time. Would that be fair to say?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:47)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:20:48)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay. So at 58 years old, you read my book, and as you described it, you flipped around. Now, I don’t mind. I’m not here to berate you for not reading every word of my book. That’s not my purpose. But out of just out of genuine curiosity, you’re anxious and worried about money all the time. It’s affected your relationship. Here you have a book, whether it’s my book or somebody else’s book. How come you didn’t read the full thing?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:21:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think for me a lot of it is I trusted the wrong person with my money, from a financial advisor who took a lot of that percentage of that growth, thinking that, oh, somebody else is looking after it. They’re going to do that job for me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:21:25)\u00a0And then just being busy in life and not making time for that. So I’ve learned actually a lot just from conversations with Vanessa. And so she’s done a lot of research and reading, and then we share that together as a couple, and that’s where a lot of this knowledge and comfortability has come from.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:21:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I’m not buying it because you said Vanessa has helped a lot, but Vanessa has been trying to get you to open up a joint account for five years, and it’s taken four years, 11 months to get it to happen. So she may be comfortable with money, but that’s her taking on all the load. If Vanessa wasn’t around, what would you be doing with your money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:01)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Probably the same thing, trusting somebody else that would look after me in retirement. I think I was at the point when I met Vanessa that I knew I needed to make changes with my money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0George, first of all, you mentioned a financial person, advisor type of person. What happened there?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I attended a seminar through work, and started investing with an investment broker. So I trusted that everything would be fine for my retirement. Kept working away at it and went, „Oh, he’s got my back. This is what’s going to happen.” But then for some reason just didn’t take that upon myself. Didn’t worry too much.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The first time I met this guy, I said, „He’s greasy, and I don’t like him.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oh, (Bleep) greasy. That’s a great insult by the way. We lost that a long time. In the 50s, you were greasy. Yes, I’m going to bring that back, Vanessa.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:48)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You’re welcome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Greasy little. All right. How much? What was the percentage? Hold on, let me guess. 1.35%. Higher. Oh.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:22:59)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I don’t even know what it ended up settling when– probably around three or more.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:23:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I was going to say, I think it’s around three.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:23:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a03%? I’m counting the number of red flags on my finger already.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:23:08)\u00a0I just have to jump in here quickly because what the\u00a0(Bleep). A 3% advisor fee will absolutely cripple your portfolio.\u00a0For example, let’s say that you start off with\u00a0$100,000\u00a0and you invest a\u00a0\u200a$1,000\u00a0a month for 30 years at a 7% return, which you can get in a lot of index funds average,\u00a0historically.\u00a0You’ll have about $2 million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:23:33)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Now let’s take the same scenario and assume that your financial advisor is charging 3%. That doesn’t sound like much, but in 30 years, instead of having $2 million, you would have just over $1 million. Do you see that this simple decision you made costs you a million dollars, 50%?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:23:56)\u00a0That means by going with this advisor, you lost 50% of your money. That’s more than all the vacations, all the coffee, all the freaking celery you agonize for over the last 30 years cost you combined. Do not do this.\u00a0Take control of your money,\u00a0and stop delegating one of the most important decisions in your life to somebody else working out of a freaking ramshackle office,\u00a0selling insurance and calzones in the same place. What the\u00a0(Bleep)?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:24:22)\u00a0No wonder George has trust issues around money. He got burned. I don’t even think he realizes how badly, but he knows it’s bad. Interestingly, Vanessa has also been burned in the past by her ex, but she has managed to rebuild. It’s quite interesting to me that some people can experience a hardship and give up.\u00a0It’s almost learned helplessness. I can’t do anything about it. I’m out checking out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:24:48)\u00a0On the other hand, some people can undergo great, great adversity,\u00a0and they approach it saying,\u00a0„That’s never\u00a0going to\u00a0happen to me. I’m\u00a0going to\u00a0change. I’m\u00a0going to\u00a0make a big change in my life.”\u00a0It’s totally unpredictable as to how people will react.\u00a0I’ve never been able to find a pattern, but it is striking that two people can experience adversity and one of them can act in a totally different way than the other.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:25:12)\u00a0Now, back to George and Vanessa. The question is, does George trust Vanessa? That’s where we’re headed next after I asked them about this sleazy financial advisor\u00a0that\u00a0charged\u00a0them a crazy amount.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Interview)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:25:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Vanessa, when you heard that George was paying a lot of money for an advisor like this, what was your reaction?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:25:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I never liked him from the beginning. He gave me the ick from the go. By the time I had listened to your book, we started exploring. I asked him like, how much are you paying? I don’t know. Let’s find out. And of course it was not a straight question and answer email situation. By the time we found out– because George had looked at his statements, and it was never growing. This guy had your money for, what, 20 years? And it was close to the same amount that had been put in.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:25:59)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And it never grew. And so I thought, I don’t trust this guy. Find out what he’s charging. And when we found out, then George’s hair was on fire, and he was furious. And all of my internal Spidey senses were saying, „I told you so.” But I didn’t say that because that’s rude. But I was thinking it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Did you think to yourself maybe George is not super savvy with money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:20)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No, I didn’t think that. I just thought that George trusted the wrong person.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:24)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. George, do you think that Vanessa is savvy with money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely. We own a house on 1.3 acres in one of the more posh neighborhoods in our town, and that was paid for by her hard work, dedication, understanding how finances and business works.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And George, do you trust her with your money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, hold on. Vanessa, do you agree with that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0In the business, he absolutely does. But in her personal life, there’s a block there, and I don’t know what it is.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:26:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I have a question. If she’s savvy with money, as you acknowledge, and you trust her, because she’s your wife, and you two co-run businesses, theoretically, wouldn’t you just agree to whatever she said about money, setting up accounts, putting money here and there?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:27:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes, theoretically. I guess the part that scares me is I didn’t realize how volatile businesses were. And seeing the downturn in our business, that scares me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:27:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What does that have to do with trusting her? If she’s the savvy one with money–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:27:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When it comes to a business and watching the businesses and finances fluctuate with that business as we’re growing them, I get really, really uncomfortable with that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:27:32)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I have a question. Have you two ever had a productive conversation around money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:27:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We have lots of other productive conversations. We can talk about all other money things till the cows come home. What should we do with this spend or with this project, or how much should it cost? We can do all of that stuff all day long. It’s the minutiae of the joint account and going back and forth.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:27:54)\u00a0I have to keep track of how much I owe him, and he doesn’t keep track of it. And then he says, I don’t know how much you owe me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:02)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Vanessa–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I feel like I have to do all the work<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:04) Ramit<\/span><b>:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do you think that I’m agreeing with you right now or not?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:27:40)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Then is this not a moment where you reflect on it and say, „Wow, I never thought about it like that. George, would you be on board to do that?” Which might actually advance your relationship forward with money versus explaining over and over what’s going on?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:25)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think that’s just habit from what I’ve had to do in a lot of conversations with George.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Does it work?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s not working with me either. You guys can keep up the same old habits of over explaining to each other. Or you can start to say like, „Hey, let’s try to understand why each of us is in this position.” And sometimes, actually, there’s not a good understanding. And sometimes, honestly, it doesn’t really matter. Sometimes people do stuff because they don’t even know why and they just (Bleep) do it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:28:53)\u00a0If I have a chance to recalibrate this, it’s that over-explaining it is not going to get us anywhere. We just need to start deciding what’s our vision together. Are we both willing to do it? Great. If so, let’s make some changes. If not, let’s talk about what that looks like too. Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:29:09)\u00a0Right now, do we agree? It seems like Vanessa comes up with an idea for combining income, for example, George says no, and that’s the end of it until the next time Vanessa brings it up, but it never goes anywhere until two weeks ago. Is that accurate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:29:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes, that’s accurate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:29:27)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:29:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. It’s clear that Vanessa initiates conversations around money and that George avoids them until Vanessa just gives up. How many people are in a scenario exactly like this? How many of you want to talk about money with your partner,\u00a0try to bring it up,\u00a0but every time you do, they avoid it?\u00a0Or worse, they get mad. They’ll say things like,\u00a0„Why can’t we ever have a nice night out without you talking about money?”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:29:51)\u00a0This is exactly why I wrote\u00a0Money for\u00a0Couples.\u00a0Because seeing how difficult it is to actually talk about money constructively, it can be soul sucking.\u00a0You’re not asking for the world.\u00a0You just want your partner to be engaged.\u00a0That is why I wrote exactly what to say, how to bring it up, even what to do if your partner storms off. You can get all of that in\u00a0Money for Couples,\u00a0my new book.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:30:16)\u00a0Now,\u00a0with George and Vanessa, I noticed that there was one moment where Vanessa approached him differently, and\u00a0it really reinforced this dynamic. This moment was subtle, but it really matters. See if you can catch what changes in this next part of their story.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:30:31)\u00a0We’re\u00a0going to\u00a0get into that conversation right after this.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Interview)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:30:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0In your application, Vanessa, you referred to going into credit card debt. From what I understand, one of the businesses was not doing particularly well, and so you didn’t pay yourself a salary for a certain number of months, and you got into credit card debt. How much credit card debt?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:30:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think it was 8,000.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:30:57)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. And what happened after you got into $8,000 of credit card debt?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:02)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I began just paying it down aggressively. But because the interest was high, I wanted to pay it off, and I wanted George’s help, and I knew he had cash in his savings. And I asked him to help me pay it off so that I wasn’t paying that interest.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Walk me through that conversation.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It was evening time. I told him about the credit card balance, which he seemed surprised by. He asked me how it got that way, and I reminded him that it was because I had taken no wages and I still had our life to pay for, and I asked him to help me pay it off.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:35)\u00a0I am pretty independent, and I don’t typically ask anybody for help. And so the fact that I was asking him for help was a real vulnerable moment for me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:47)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How did you ask it? What words did you use?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I was pretty direct. I said, „Can you help me pay off this credit card?”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. What did he say?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:31:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He was quiet for a moment. There was definitely a pause. And then he had said, „What would this look like? Would you be paying this back? Would this be a loan?” And I said, „No, I just need you to help me pay this off.” And he was quiet again, which to me, I read as a no.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:10)\u00a0And then I let it sit for a little bit, and I re-approached it again later that evening. And I said, „I really need your help with this.” And he said, „If I needed the help, what would you do?” And I said, „I would just give you the (Bleep) money.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:22)\u00a0Then later on that night, I think he was feeling guilty, and he offered me the money. And I felt really conflicted because I didn’t want to take money from him feeling like he was being bullied into it, even though I needed the money. So then I didn’t know what to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So what did you do in the end?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I ended up having to pay it more slowly, but I paid it off.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s very interesting. I’m struck by your retelling of the story. Do you see certain interpretations you made that may or may not have been accurate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:54)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What are they?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:32:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0The one where I was projecting an assumption that he was offering the money out of guilt.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Correct. Who knows? Maybe he just thought about it and needed a few hours and then he was like, „Hey, I love you. Here’s the money.” So yes, that’s one. What else? When he’s silent–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That it’s a no.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Right. Didn’t hear a no. Just heard silence. Maybe it’s a no. Or maybe it’s, I need time to think. Who knows? George, what do you think about those interpretations? Was she right or not?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So I do remember her asking, and obviously, my wife, I want to help her. I just didn’t really know how. So do I go and take money out of a line of credit? Where do I find that money to help her pay that off? I like to have a big safety net. And now to grow the businesses, obviously I’ve had to use that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hold on. Did you say any of this to her?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:47)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What the (Bleep)?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I know.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So you just were silent, leaving a huge vacuum and leaving her to come up with maybe the worst interpretation. George, I think your questions are totally legit. It’s the same questions I’d be thinking. Where would the money come from? What does it mean? What’s the effect going to be on my retirement, our retirement, and on and on and on? Lots of questions. All valid, but she didn’t know any of those.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:34:12)\u00a0She just thought he means no, and she just left. And then what about later when you offered her the money? Were you feeling guilty?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:33:33)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No, I don’t think I was. I think I genuinely wanted to help. I just didn’t know how. So the solution now is obviously combining finances and then it’s not a question. It’s just this is our debt. This is our wealth. Instead of this is my debt, your wealth, my whatever.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:34:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Let’s pause for a second. Vanessa, I noticed you are crying a little bit. I want to check in with you. What’s going on?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:34:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I know that George loves me, and I know that I’m not alone in stuff, but asking for help is not something I’m good at, and asking him to help me and him not telling me that his answer wasn’t a no or that he just needed some time– let me think about it– I have nothing to go on, it just reaffirmed to me that as alone as I’ve been in most things in my life, especially after my divorce, that, oh, yeah, it’s going to be here too.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Meaning you felt alone, and looking back, you still feel alone by the silence.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. It certainly didn’t make me feel connected.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:18)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0George, you hear that word connected?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:21)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm. I do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s a word I don’t think a lot of men talk about. I certainly didn’t grow up hearing that word or thinking about it. It’s not like a male word. You know what I mean? Is it for you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Somewhat. I think that it’s an important part of the work I do, the relationship that I have is, that connection. Money’s a little bit different for me, I’m guessing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. It’s interesting. So you’re maybe, what, connected to nature? Would that be accurate?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:35:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay. That’s where we differ. I’m not connected to– I’m like, „Nature, what’s that?” All right. But that’s actually powerful. We all have something that we are connected to, but in my day-to-day growing up, I didn’t use the word connected when it came to relationships. Certainly not intimate partners. I hear Vanessa using that word. Vanessa, how long have you been thinking of or using that word, connected?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:36:20)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, as far back as I can remember.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:36:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. I’ve started to use it, George, a lot, being connected. Now, there’s a lot of different things. There’s different ages, different cultures, different genders. There’s all kinds of forces that play here. But I’ve realized from a gender perspective, sometimes I tend to optimize a lot.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:36:41)\u00a0I want to get the numbers right. Or I know folks who play the opposite game. They’re fearful. I think, George, you would probably describe your relationship with money a lot like that. And what I’m hearing from Vanessa, which I think is a really good thing, is sometimes connection is the first thing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:36:58)\u00a0The two of you might even make a bad financial purchase. Maybe you waste 500 bucks on something. But if the two of you are connected in the grand scheme, that $500, it’s not that big of a deal. But being connected is way more important.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I 100% agree with it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I know you agree, Vanessa. George, what about you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:18)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0100%. Because that’s huge.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:21)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, I love it. Do you see how your responses, George, when Vanessa came to ask in a tough situation probably produced a disconnect, not a connection?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:32)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. If you were to be able to change anything, you could go back in time, what would you have done differently?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0If I could go back and change those things, of course, I’m going to help you. Let’s sit down and figure this out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:41)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wow. Vanessa?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:37:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just listening to that imaginary replay of the scenario, hearing George’s response, it’s like instant relief. It’s not a no. I’m not alone. You are going to help me. We’re a team.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I really love that. You are a team. I really love that, George, because the way you answered honors your need to take some time and to think about it. I respect that. I would never ask you to, hey, write a check for 10 grand on the spot.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:08)\u00a0But, „Hey, I love you. I know it takes a lot for you to ask for help, and of course, you know I want to find out a way for us to do this. Let’s sit down and figure it out.” Give each other a hug, go to sleep, and the next day when you’re fresh, wake up and talk about it. That’s the way you do it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Beautiful. Okay. I like this. I like this. These are tools that you can use going forward, but a lot of it is just communicating what you’re actually feeling. George, do you see a therapist?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great. Okay. Awesome. So these are things that will become much more available and comfortable for you. Fantastic. And Vanessa, how about for you? You see the same couple’s therapist?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:48)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, we see the same couple\u2019s therapist, and I’ve also been in one-on-one therapy for a decade.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:38:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, great. Can I ask, Vanessa, some tougher financial questions now? So how’d you get into 8k of credit card debt?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:02)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Just having to pay for just life stuff, the household bills and groceries and that sort of thing when my income had stopped from our one business.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How long did it take for you to accumulate that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, it probably happened over the course of the eight months.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Why not bring it up with George after the first month?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0He was aware that I wasn’t getting an income.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:22)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Well, was he aware that you were accumulating credit card debt?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No, no, we wouldn’t talk about that because we keep separate finances.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:30)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What’s that response that you just gave me?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:32)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s like pulling teeth to get him to want to talk about this stuff as a us.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:37)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And so again, it was like I’m on my own. And so if I’m on my own and I have to rely just on me, if I’m getting myself in, I have to get myself out. And I don’t ask him because he’s not the one putting that money on that credit card. I have to pay my half of the bills, and so I have to be the one to pay it out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:39:56)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. It’s got to be frustrating. It’s got to feel alone, like you said. And then by the time you bring it up, it’s a bigger problem than it would’ve been had you brought it up first month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:40:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:40:06)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You said, „We’re a team,” Vanessa. And it seems to me like when you two are in business, you’re a team. You get it. You’re both playing your part. That’s awesome. Again, I just want to remind you, that’s what I want for your personal finances, is for you two to be a team. And part of a team is having a healthy culture where you can bring these things up. You can talk about it, good and bad.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:40:24)\u00a0If one of you needs time to think about it, that’s okay. You are comfortable enough to say that. „Hey, right now I need to process this, but tomorrow at 6:00, I’d love to pick it back up again.” And then of course there’s the structural part. Let’s make sure that we have our money combined. If we need to create some rules about a postnup, we can do that. But let’s really make sure our money is easier to visualize together. That’s where we’re going to go.” How does that sound to both of you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:40:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, that sounds like such a relief.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:40:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Amazing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:40:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, good. Conceptually, we’re there. Let’s try to figure out how we get there. What do you say we take a look at the numbers?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:40:59)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Let’s do it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:41:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. Who created the conscious spending plan?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:41:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I was at the computer, but we were side by side, and we did it absolutely as a team together.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:41:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, good. Okay. How did it feel to do it together?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:41:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I loved it actually because I can see something in front of me. I’m not going on feeling and reactions. I’m going on math. I’m going on concrete numbers. I’m going on a plan. Give me a plan. Show me the numbers. I’m in.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:41:24)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That’s pretty interesting. Vanessa, have you found George to be very plan-oriented?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:41:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely. And he likes the concrete, which took me a long time to figure out that that’s what he needed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:41:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0 That’s interesting. I’m surprised right now. George, I did not expect you to have really enjoyed the CSP creation process, but I love that you did.\u00a0And the fact that you’ve now twice said you love a good plan. You love seeing it concretely. I believe you. I totally believe you. So now I’m like, \u201cIs that what we need to do here?”\u00a0But then I go,\u00a0„Wait a second. What the\u00a0(Bleep)?”\u00a0Look at this book. What about the plan in that one, George?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:02)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s sitting over there under the coffee table.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. I’m going to put this thing up on screen. Let’s go.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Vanessa, can you read the word in bold and then the full number next to it, please.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:16)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So that’s the assets,\u00a0and we are 3.477 million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:21)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:22)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0And then investments,\u00a0157,500. Savings is 30,187.\u00a0And then the debt is 478,389.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Total net worth?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0 3.186 million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, great. How do you feel about those numbers?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:40)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I love those numbers, especially because I came from nothing. I had to rebuild everything.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great. George?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:48)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So when Vanessa first showed those numbers to me, I was in disbelief. How could I be worth that? Because I look at my bank account, when I look at those types of things, I’m like, „No, no, no. There’s a disconnect here.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:42:57)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay. Can we drill into those? What is $3.477 million worth of assets? What is that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So that’s house. That’s other assets that we have, like boats, cars, those types of things.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wait, wait, wait. Give me the numbers. Break them down.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I don’t know what they are.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Why is that? Now I’m curious because just a second ago, George, you said, „I’m a chart guy. I’m a numbers guy.” This is a pretty big number, $3.47 million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It is a big number. Vanessa’s been handling that part.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What if Vanessa didn’t handle all this stuff?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I guess I’d be either forced, a, to figure it out on my own.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Or?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just keep living life like it was going to be okay at some point, which is not where I’m at. I like the numbers. I like to have a plan.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Pretty interesting moment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, I need to know those numbers better, obviously.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Vanessa, what are the assets?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:43:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So we’ve got the house. We bought that for 525,000. George’s truck, he owns that outright. My car, I’ve got another 7,000 owing on it. We’ve got two snowmobiles, which is part of George’s trapline business. He’s got a family cabin. We have a holiday trailer that we use that’s our summer accommodations when we run our Alaska store.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:44:10)\u00a0And then we’ve got the Canadian business and the US business. And so when we evaluated those, we just based it off of times three of last year’s revenue, which is within the range of industry standard for our two stores.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:44:21)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Three times revenue, not three times profit?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:44:24)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If it’s profit, that’s obviously a different number.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:44:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0For the purposes of today, I’m not a valuation expert, but I always like to be conservative always. Let’s just if we drop that down by half, that would take you down to about $2.3 million or so, ballpark. How would you feel about that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:44:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Cool.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:44:51)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Makes no difference to you. Two, three, whatever. All right, cool. Good to know. Investments are at 157,000. Is that both of you or predominantly one of you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No, that’s mostly George.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:01)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0George, how’d you do that? That’s cool.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:04)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0RSPs and my investment broker. Now, I’ve taken that, and I’ve used some of that money for down payment on the house.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0In the US, you can borrow against your 401(k), but the people who do it usually don’t pay themselves back.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:16)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s forced. It happens when you do your taxes. They just take the minimum. You’re allowed to put on more, but you’re forced to repay it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wow. Very good. All right. Savings are at 30k. Fine. And then debt, what’s the debt? The house?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:30)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0The house and that little bit of balance left on my car.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:33)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. How much is a snowmobile cost?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0New, 20,000.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And the cabin, how much is that worth?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Not very much.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Hold on. I just need to describe both of their faces because it’s so funny. They looked like some little kid just put a booger on their hand. It’s like, „Ah God. What are you going to do? Freaking kids.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:45:56)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s not like a bougie beach house situation. This is completely off grid, no power.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:02)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0But there is stuff there that are attached to that are mine specifically, that are non-family assets, like boat generators, that kind of stuff that we take out there with us and use out there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:13)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. By the way, this is in Canadian dollars. Correct?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:16)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, so we should make note of that because right now it’s 72 cents to the dollar, if I’m getting that correct.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:25)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s probably close. Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right.\u00a0Let’s continue with the income.\u00a0George, what is the combined household income number that you see here per month?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0 16,800.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right, so $201,600 per year. Who knew that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Both knew that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0George?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I never gave it a whole bunch of thought. I knew roughly what I made.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:48)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How much did you think you made, by the way?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Prior to retiring and taking on a new position, I knew exactly how much I made.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:56)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0You actually just found out that you make 20,000 more a year than you thought.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:46:59)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, I think so.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">00:47:01)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Theoretically then, if you find that out, that should solve all the money problems. Right?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:06)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Should.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:06)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a020k extra. What are we doing here?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. But you also think that we live paycheck to paycheck.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Do you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:13)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No, we’ve got plans. We invest some, and we’ve got some savings.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:16)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay, let’s continue looking down.\u00a0Fixed costs are at 46%. That’s quite low. Very good. Since it’s so low, I really have no feedback at all. But just to take a quick note, your mortgage is 3,000 bucks. Your car payment is 1,397.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:33)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, that’s with all of the fuel and everything. My car payment is 700.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:38)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All\u00a0right. Groceries 1,100.\u00a0Clothes are at 200. So what are we missing here? Nothing. I believe your numbers. I believe them. What I see is no childcare. I\u00a0see no debt payments. I see a very high income, $201,000. Great. Very\u00a0nice. No comments. 46%.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:47:58)\u00a0What that tells me is you have margin to play with. You have extra money. So then my question as I work my way down the CSP is where did they choose to put their money? So let’s take a look.\u00a0Your investments are at 10% combined. One is doing 14%.\u00a0One is doing 7%.\u00a0I would characterize that as fine.\u00a0For an older couple who hasn’t particularly invested a lot in the past,\u00a0I would say way under.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:48:25)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I agree with that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:48:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Room to dramatically boost that number up.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:48:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I\u00a0want to\u00a0jump in here to point something out. Vanessa and George have a high net worth on paper, but that’s quite misleading.\u00a0Their investments are only $157,000, which is a red flag at their age. The bulk of their net worth comes from how they have valued their businesses. But valuations are very tricky,\u00a0and they are rarely what you hope they will be.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:48:52)\u00a0Even if they sold both businesses tomorrow, it’s questionable whether they would walk away with millions.\u00a0Maybe realistically they might clear under a million dollars total. Now when you factor in 500k of debt, suddenly George’s anxiety about retirement makes a lot more sense.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:49:10)\u00a0At their current rate of $1,400 a month in contributions, and with just six years until George turns 65, my investment calculator shows their portfolio would grow to just $352,000.\u00a0That’s it. Now, there are a lot of variables. George will have a pension, but his fear of not having enough suddenly starts to make a little bit of sense. It’s not informed by the numbers. It’s just a feeling,\u00a0but\u00a0the feeling itself is valid. Now my job is to help them create a plan that they can feel good about.\u00a0So let’s see if we can get them there. Let’s keep going.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Interview)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:49:48)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Savings are at 9%.\u00a0Fine. Your savings that you currently have is $30,000, which is about five months of spend. Okay. I don’t mind it. It could\u00a0be\u00a0a\u00a0bit longer now.\u00a0I’m recommending for Americans to build a 12-month emergency fund due to what’s going on with tariffs, etc.,\u00a0but okay.\u00a0And then finally we see\u00a0\u200aguilt-free\u00a0spending at 35%. That’s $4,900 a month. I’m not sure I believe that. You don’t spend 4,900 a month, right?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:50:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:50:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No. So where does the money go?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:50:18)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Where does the money go? We don’t have very many subscriptions. We’re not big shoppers.\u00a0There’s a bit of travel that we’ve had to do,\u00a0but historically,\u00a0when we travel, it’s been go travel, put it on the card, then pay it off after, which has always been really uncomfortable for me, especially in those early years of getting back on my financial\u00a0feet.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:50:37)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Where does the money go?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:50:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think it just gets frittered away on impulsive things, like meals out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:50:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What else? George?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:50:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I spend a bit of money on the trapline, but as far as other big expenses go, we don’t spend a whole bunch of money. We’re not out eating in fancy restaurants all the time. We’re not flying down to Edmonton to go watch hockey games or anything like that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What’s this trap thing, though? Isn’t this trapping thing part of the business?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:04)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It is a sole proprietorship.\u00a0It’s a complicated thing with having to maintain it and operate it in order to keep the possession of the right to trap on this property and having– we have to spend. It zeros out at the end of the day.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:21)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It zeros out pretty much.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Guys, got it. What’s up with the over explanation?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Is this a Canadian thing?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s exhausting, but I feel like sometimes I have to package things in\u00a0100\u00a0different ways to find the one that’s\u00a0going to\u00a0land.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, I know one big expense. I bought a camper for myself. Vanessa calls it my fishing fort.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:41)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Are we not talking about the over explanation, which is way more important than the camper?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:46)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:47)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What’s happening? Why do you over explain things?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Hear me, participate, connect with me. Hear me, participate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:51:54)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0If I say 50 words, it’s obviously not enough. Let me say 500. Surely something in that entire paragraph has to get you. And George, why do you over explain?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:52:06)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Because I don’t think I know my finances as well as I should.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:52:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Great answer. George, do you say, „I don’t know about money?”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:52:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:52:18)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0All right. The over-explaining is one piece of homework for the two of you because it’s almost like you come over for dinner to my house. I have candy canes and turkey and rotting chicken and fish. I have just too much (Bleep) on my kitchen table. I’m like, „Here you go. Dinner is served.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:52:38)\u00a0And you’re like, „What the (Bleep)? I just want a nice curated dinner with chicken and rice. That would be better than 800 different dishes. It’s the same thing with answering each other’s questions and talking about money. I really want you to be able to connect more concisely.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:52:56)\u00a0All right. Back in the CSP. According to this, you have $4,900 a month for guilt-free spending, which is 35%. That’s a lot of money. How do you feel about seeing a number like $4,900 a month in discretionary spending?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I want to see that going into investments. If there’s that much extra and we both don’t feel like we’re using it, then that to me reads a lot like it’s being wasted or spent unconsciously, and I’d rather have it turn into more for later.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, got you. George, how about you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think that’s a lot of money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:33)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. There’s no feeling in there?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:41)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. You ever use the wheel of emotion? Have you guys ever done this? All right, you’re going to do it. Neither of you gave me a feeling. Did you notice that? (00:53:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I noticed it with George.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:53:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Look at this feeling thing. Look at all these words. Let’s start with angry. Under angry, there’s all different kinds. There’s let down, humiliated, bitter. And then within those, there’s words like indignant, violated, furious. But then there’s also words like fearful. George, which of those words would you use to describe your feelings about your personal finances?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:54:18)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think there’s a little bit of fearfulness or frightened and a little bit overwhelmed would be the first two that really stand out for sure.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:54:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Anything else?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:54:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Maybe nervous. Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:54:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Nervous. Okay, good. I like that. Vanessa, how about for you? What word stands out to you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:54:33)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When I look at the fearful one, I actually see some on that outer ring that do actually resonate for me inadequate, insignificant, excluded, inferior.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:54:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It’s powerful, isn’t it? It’s the first time I think I’ve really heard the two of you talk about feelings with money. I think part of the over explaining is just a way to stay away from how you’re actually feeling. If I can talk and talk and misdirect, then I don’t have to confront how I actually feel. I can stay surface level. I can bounce the ball back to my partner. Why doesn’t he do this?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:55:08)\u00a0Or innocent doe, I don’t know how I feel. That would be you, George. And we’re actually not connecting on a deeper level. Vanessa, when you say I feel insignificant, inferior, gosh, if I’m you, George, I’m like, „Tell me where that comes from. I hate to hear my wife feeling that way.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:55:26)\u00a0And similarly, Vanessa, if I hear George saying, „I feel overwhelmed,” I say, „Look, hearing that hurts me. I want to know how do you feel overwhelmed.” And if you want to take some time and write it down, write it down. Let’s talk about it tomorrow. But I do want to talk about it with you. That’s how we start to connect.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:55:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:55:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What do y’all think about that little exercise? I learned that from my own therapist.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:55:49)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s incredible. I’m going to print it out and put it on my fridge.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:55:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Definitely. Oh, I have one in my desk. My wife was tired of asking me like, „How do you feel about this?” I’m like, „Good.” I’m not allowed to use it. She asked me, „Your book’s in New York Times bestseller. How do you feel?” I’m like, „Good.” She’s like, „How else? Roll the wheel out?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:56:09)\u00a0So emotions can be good. They can be bad. They can be stressful. There’s so many different ones. But learning that language of expressing them with each other is something you’re going to get really good at in therapy. Okay, cool. Back to the CSP, can I ask the question again? How do you feel realizing you have over $4,000 a month in discretionary income?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:56:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I actually feel a lot of stuff.\u00a0I feel disbelief. When I think about having actually spent that money, I feel an impending sense of doom and tremendous guilt and like a failure. If I don’t know where that money’s gone, I feel like I’ve failed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:56:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great. That’s honest. Thank you. George, how about you? How do you feel about having over $4,000 a month in discretionary income?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:56:51)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I feel excited. If we get a plan, we could do some real good with it. So I’m optimistic. But there still is a bit of me that has that fear that leads to anxiety. Even though it looks really good and I’m excited, I still have this anxiety about it, and I need to really dig deep into that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:57:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Good. You’re going to have that a lot. Can I give you a metaphor, George? If I’m not too familiar with the outdoors. Let’s say I come to the outdoors where it’s your backyard, you know it like the back of your hand. I come up there. I go on a tour with you. You’re going to, of course, take care of me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:57:27)\u00a0I’m still going to feel anxious. You’re going to say, „Ramit, it’s okay. I’ve done this a million times. We have all the right people with–” I’m going to be like, „Yeah, yeah, yeah, I believe you. And am I going to freeze to death? Is this going to happen? Is that going to happen?”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:57:40)\u00a0And you are going to look at me like, „Why are you so worried? Don’t worry about all this stuff. Trust me.” Or, „You are capable, Ramit.” And probably what I need to do is overcome my fear, get some reps in, build my confidence. Because I have no confidence in going to the outdoors. Why would I? I haven’t done it very much. You see how that applies to your relationship with money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:58:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Absolutely. My fear is driving my decision making.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:58:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes, yes. And both of you have areas of life where you are very competent. So connecting to those feelings of competence. When I’m good, this is what I do. This is how I feel. These are the things that go through my head. And then writing down, when I talk about money solo or with my partner, I feel this. I feel that I avoid. I use these words. And then just looking at the two is going to be quite striking on paper.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:58:34)\u00a0It’s like, oh my God. No wonder I’m competent at this. I operate completely differently. Then you translate the final step is what if I use those same principles with money? Well, we’d probably sit down regularly. We would make up a series of rules, like, we talk about money before 7:00 PM because we are alert and aware. But after 7:00 PM it’s like, we’re not talking about that. Make those rules up, and you’re going to find you’re going to be so much more successful. Okay. We have a lot more to talk about, but how are you feeling so far? I just want to check in with you. Vanessa?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:07)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Good, good. Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, better. Absolutely. It feels good to be able to put these things out there that sometimes you hold inside and you don’t know how to bring them out. I feel like I’m such a good communicator, but when it comes to money, that there’s something that just makes it really difficult. So this is really helping me deal with that. Oh, and one of our rules is we don’t go out this time of year at night without bear spray.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s a rule.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:30)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, yeah. Okay. I love that rule. That’s great. Bear spray is a matter of last resort. If you have to pull out that bear spray, you’re in a danger zone. Okay?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:40)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:40)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0What is the equivalent for your money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Let me think about that for a sec.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:47)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Good answer, by the way. I love that answer. Think about it. Think about it. No need to rush. Think about it. Vanessa?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(00:59:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I think I would want to sit with this one and actually discuss it with George after sitting with it for a while. Because I would want to make sure that we both agree that it’s something that’s emergency level.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:00:04)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. For the purposes of the hypothetical, let’s take my family. What do you think is an equivalent to carry bear spray financially speaking?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:00:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Having that 12 months saved up.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:00:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Nice. We always have a large emergency fund. Yes. In case something happens, we know we can survive. That is a beautiful connection. These are the kind of things you can do. That will be awesome. And when you do this together, oh my God, it’s so fun because one person might say, „I really want to get a 12-month emergency fund.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:00:41)\u00a0And then the other person will say, „That’s so interesting. How come?” Tell me more. And the person will say, „I just feel this. I feel that.” You go, „Awesome.” And the person’s taking notes because it shows a lot of respect to write it down. And then the other person might say, „I love that. I also want an emergency fund.” Notice my agreeing. „I wonder if we could start with a three-month emergency fund. Could we start by getting it up to seven months? And I’d love to talk to you again and see where we are.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:01:08)\u00a0That’s a beautiful back and forth. And you both feel connected. You both accomplish something. You got the money rolling and automating. Now you are really building something together. That’s how you do it. Honestly, some of these answers are already inside of you because of who you are.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:01:25)\u00a0You already know how to prepare for danger. So do the same with your money. You already know how to enjoy going out and doing what you both do with your business. So do the same with your money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:01:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:01:37)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, cool. Let’s keep going. George, I want to talk about retirement now. You’re 59 years old. What does retirement look like for you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:01:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0One of the things I’ll never stop doing is being active and having an income. I always be active and having an income from other sources, but I want to choose some of those things. For example, there’s a canoe trip that’s going from one community to the other this summer. I’d love to be a part of that, is doing those meaningful things.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:02:02)\u00a0For example, when we travel, I’m not a vacationer. I like traveling. I like to have a purpose there. Why are you here? What are you learning? Are you here for a specific focus? That’s what retirement looks like for me. I love youth. I love our land-based programs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:02:15)\u00a0I’d like to spend a lot of time in my retirement, being part of different canoe programs or land-based programs. Now, fortunately right now I have a job that I get to do many of those things, and that’s probably what’s keeping me walking through the doors, is that I love the work that I’m doing for those six months. But I also love my time in the summers with my own store.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:02:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0 What about the financial part of retirement? Do you know how much you need?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:02:39)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I actually don’t know how much I need. So Vanessa and I have calculated and have come up with some numbers on how we can take what we need to live by month and how much we need to have in savings and then be able to live off the interest of that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:02:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Vanessa, what is that number?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:02:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It depends on which retirement scenario we actually do. If we retire in Canada, we need a ton more money than if we retire to Mexico, which is another scenario that we talk about. Those are two very different financial scenarios.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0When are you going to decide? Because George is 59 years old.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I’m nowhere near ready to retire. I’m in the peak of my career, so I’ve got another 10 or 15 years of working. So the dream of retiring to Mexico, I don’t think is possible until I also retire with him 10 to 15 years from now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay, so George is, let’s just say 70.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:32)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How do you feel about that, George?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Old. That’s such a hard one because we don’t know what our health’s going to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:03:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We don’t know because for me, I love being active. My fall after we closed the Skagway store, before we turned back to work, I went out and found wild rivers to go fly fishing on. Literally walking through the bush and willows up to my eyeballs, and getting out to the river to fly fish. That drives me. I love the fly fishing and the adventure, but that requires a tremendous amount of health.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:04:04)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:04:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So I don’t want to wait till I’m 70 to get to do some of those things. That’s why I’m doing some of them now, and I think that’s important.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:04:11)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0First of all, just hearing the way you describe the outdoor activities, it sounds awesome. It really sounds amazing. You definitely sound connected to the outdoors. I bet you there’s a bunch of people listening, they’re like, „Dude, this guy lives the life. Does he give tours?” Because everything, you’re just casually reeling, oh, I went canoeing. I went this. I went that. It’s like, sounds amazing. I think a lot of people would love to be able to do that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:04:36)\u00a0So I hear a lot of richness in what you do today and what you want to do in your retirement. And what I can do is try to help you figure out how to do that. Vanessa, I can hear you saying you’re at the peak of your career. You don’t have any immediate plans.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:04:53)\u00a0So can I just tell you how I would approach this? I am not forcing either of you to put something in stone that says, „On this date, George has to retire.” That’s not how life works. If you like it, great. If you want to have options to maybe cut back on this or that, fantastic. I want you to have lots of options, but I want you to have planned for them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:05:17)\u00a0So if George, for example, starts disliking his current job, here’s what it would require. That’s what I want you to have as a playbook for retirement. And then you can keep it on your fridge or put it somewhere and review it every three to six months and just check in with yourself.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:05:37)\u00a0Some of this is just a feeling. It’s like, ah, I’m over this. Or, I’m loving it. Let’s keep it going. This is great. But you got to have the numbers to back it up. Right now, George, your investments alone can’t sustain your retirement. There’s just not enough. I believe you have a pension. What is that? 2,500 a month?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:05:57)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. That’s just bang on.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:05:59)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, 2,500 a month. Plus the retirement, which would be a modest amount. What about the businesses? Have you thought about selling those at some point?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:09)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. But we haven’t talked specifically what that looks like and what they would be worth.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:13)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Can I just ask it like a really weird question? What if you sold one of them today? I’m not saying you have to. I’m just asking what would happen.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah, if we sold the Alaska store, we could make money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:22)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Like how much?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:22)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Maybe 350,000, half a million.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great. These are good things to consider. I’m not saying you have to sell tomorrow. In fact, I don’t even think you would. From the way that you two talk about it, you love it. But if I’m you and I’m creating a plan, I’m putting all different options on the table. Sell the house. Sell the snowmobiles. It’s all up to you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:06:42)\u00a0And then you just start to put the pieces together, like Tetris. Okay, what would allow us to do what? Right now it seems that the two of you have been so stuck playing small with things like setting accounts up for literally five years that you have not been talking about the important stuff, the vision. Y’all are not 23 years old. And so time is ticking. I want you to have a healthy, happy retirement; healthy, happy, continued work. And in order to do that, we have to make some big decisions.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:07:20)\u00a0The fact that you have an extra, at least 3,500 a month, probably more, really tells me you could be investing a tremendous amount of money every month. And while I can’t run your numbers for you right now, there’s just too many uncertainties, honestly, to be able to put aside like 40, $50,000 a year in investments for the next 10 years, that is a lot of money. Would you consider doing that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:07:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:07:44)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:07:45)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Candidly, from the way you talk about your spending, you probably wouldn’t even miss a lot of it, which is actually crazy, but cool. And I heard you. Vanessa, earlier, you were like, „I feel ashamed.” And actually, that’s so common. People will look back. They’ll be in their 40s or 50s, and they’ll look back, and they’ll be like, „I made all this money. I have very little to show for it.” And they feel so ashamed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:08:03)\u00a0And part of my job is just like, look, we all wish we were perfect personal finance people when we were 15 years old, but most of us are not. Let’s start today, and let’s get super aggressive. So in order to do that, what do you think are the three key steps you would have to take to come up with a really good plan?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:08:20)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think we should probably start with agreeing on what it is we want.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:08:26)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s number one. What’s next?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:08:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Decide on how much we’re going to start investing. Just start doing the thing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:08:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great. Start investing a certain amount. Great. What else?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:08:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Understanding more about where those finances are going. Agreeing to and building those systems, and have fun doing it, which can be exciting. And then number three is that monthly investment with the safety plan in place. That would make me feel really good.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:08:51)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. Honestly, can we all give each other a round of applause here? Because that was phenomenal, phenomenal. You identified the most important things. You identified things I didn’t even think of. You talk about, what is our \u200aRich Life? We got to start there. What are we working towards? And it’s okay if we don’t know all of it. It’s fine.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:09:10)\u00a0But let’s at least get some rough sketches out, and let’s be unapologetic about it. If we want to go to Mexico, let’s write it down. Let’s paint the picture. What are we going to eat there? If we want to continue doing what we’re doing, how long? How will we know if it’s going well? How much does this business need to make?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:09:26)\u00a0Because if it’s not making money, we’re going to cut it loose. Boom. We’re being decisive. I love that. Next up, it’s like, „Hey, we got to start investing aggressively and saving.” Each of you, it’s interesting, you both are aligned in that, Vanessa, you want to invest more. And George, you want to save more. To which I say, great. You can actually do both.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:09:46)\u00a0And I really like what you said, George, about we got to have fun along the way. Money has not been fun for a long time in this relationship.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:09:54)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:09:56)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So if you were going to make it fun, what would you do?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:09:58)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We love celebrating the milestones in our business, so there’s always a bottle of Prosecco involved, and some great snacks. And I think when we have done any sort of daydreaming and loose planning around our money goals, we’ll sit together. We’ll have the lights low. We make it really fun, and we decide when we’re going to do it, and we really honor that commitment to protect that time so that we do it together and really, really enjoy it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:10:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Honestly, sounds amazing to me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:10:25)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think the one thing that Vanessa has brought into my life when it comes to our \u200aRich Life is those celebrations. So this is a big, big, big birthday for me. Turning 60 is no joke. I don’t have a plan, but I know what I want to do. I learned to fly gliders at 16 years old.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:10:40)\u00a0It was the craziest, scariest thing I’ve ever done, was to leave my tiny little home in the North, a town of 450 people, to go to Ontario to learn to fly gliders. And for my 60th birthday, I would love it if I’m sitting in a glider on my 60th birthday with my beautiful wife in the glider with me and us out flying around in a glider. And that’s how we celebrate my 60th. For her 50th, which is a couple years later–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:11:03)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0We’re going to go to Italy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:11:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:11:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wow. You guys are really living this full \u200aRich Life. It’s so beautiful hearing it. I love seeing both of your faces as you talk about it too. It seems to me that with an income of $200,000 a year, with these businesses, with the investments, and certainly the guilt-free spending that’s there, you honestly are living an incredible life. You could live an even richer life. And in order to get there, you have to become decisive about money. Playing at the 3-dollar level just isn’t going to work anymore.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:11:37)\u00a0So things like, let’s combine income, if one partner doesn’t feel comfortable, say that. And the other partner will say, „Okay, tell me why.” And it’s the other person’s job to answer. You got to be honest in order to live a \u200aRich Life, honest with yourself, honest with the people around you. If the answer is like, „You know what? I don’t know why I feel uncomfortable. I just feel uncomfortable.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:11:56)\u00a0Then the correct answer is, „Totally understand that. Let’s talk about it in therapy this week. And one way or another, we probably need to do this anyway, so we’ll talk about it. I want you to find a way to feel comfortable, but we have to do it. Our future is together.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:12:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:12:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:12:15)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I was imagining, if we sit down together and we create this plan of like, what do we want, and what are the increments of how we’re going to get there, that could be a lot of bottles of Prosecco. That could be a lot of little celebrations all the way along. And make it as fun as possible. So we’re super driven to get to the next achievement.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:12:32)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Check out my journal. I think I would recommend the two of you to use it together. You can each get a copy, and it’s fun because you’ll write down like, what’s my perfect day? What would our 50th and 60th birthday look like? And then you’ll surprise each other. It’s so fun. No numbers. And it creates this vision.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:12:50)\u00a0Okay, speaking of numbers though, I do want to just go back into the CSP and take a look. So here we go. This is purely hypothetical, but I’d like you to tell me what to do with your money right now just so we can simulate what you might choose to do. Right now, if you notice, you have 35% in guilt-free spending. That’s 4,900 bucks a month. What might you do with that money?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:13:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I\u00a0want to\u00a0put about 300 a month into my post-tax,\u00a0and I\u00a0want to\u00a0put about 700 into my pre-tax.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:13:28)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay, cool. That took that number down by\u00a0$1,000. Makes perfect sense. So you are now investing 17% combined, and you have 28% \u200aguilt-free spending. Nice work. What you basically did was you redirected \u200a$1,000 from \u200aguilt-free spending to investments. Beautiful. George, your turn.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:13:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I’ll match her on what she’s doing, so we grow that together.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:13:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Ooh. I love that. I’m\u00a0going to\u00a0put\u00a01,000. Wow. Now we’re talking. So you are investing 24%. I love that. That’s great. That’s aggressive. I like that. And I want to point out you have 21% left in your guilt-free spending. That’s very good. George, didn’t you mention wanting to build up more of a savings?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:14:17)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes. I think we initially started at three months, but I like to shoot for six months. Let’s go with that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:14:24)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Well, I’ll tell you what, you’re already at five months. Did you know that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:14:27)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0No. Let’s go for eight.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:14:30)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Hold on. I just want point out what just happened. This is so classic. So somebody would be like, „I really want to make this much money.” And then I like look at their numbers. It’s like, you actually already make that much money. And they’re like, „Oh, I still feel bad. I know. I need to make an extra 50 grand.” Just take a second and appreciate it. You wanted six months, and you have five months. That’s (Bleep) awesome. Celebrate. Round of applause. You did it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:14:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:14:52)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Five months. It’s so good. Now if you want to do eight, I don’t mind. We can easily make it happen. But notice that your reaction was instantaneous. It was just like, „Oh, I need more.” Yeah, it was panicky. And a measured response, especially for your \u200aRich Life is to say like, „Hey, let me go back and revisit, why did I want six months? I probably should have written down, where did I come up with that? Why? What does it mean to me? If that’s still true and I did six months, then great. I’m done.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:15:21)\u00a0„I can take the money and put it elsewhere. If I’ve decided times have changed and I want to get eight months or nine months, also fine. But we want to talk about this with our partner. We want to be thoughtful and do it for a reason.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:15:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:15:36)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. I am going to honor your request. Just to show you what I might do,\u00a0I might take, let’s say 500 bucks a month from guilt-free spending, and I might add it to savings. Okay. Wow. I really like that because now your guilt-free spending is at 17%. I like that number for where you are. Typically, I recommend 20 to 35%. You are later in life. You haven’t been aggressive about saving or investing, so I actually think that number should be lower than 20.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:16:08)\u00a0I think you should be investing and saving aggressively. If it were up to me, depending on how aggressive you decide to be with your retirement, I might take that number as low as 10%. Truthfully, it sounds like you’d be fine the way you describe what you spend your money on with 10%. You’d have 1,500 bucks a month to spend on things that you like to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:16:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s a lot.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:16:33)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Okay. It’d be fine for you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:16:34)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:16:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Amazing. If I’m you, I’m going, we actually have $1,500 a month, and we’re going to spend it on things we love– eating out, whatever. Every month we are going to spend that. We have to. Knowing we are aggressively investing and saving other places. That’s a great life. And then as your business changes, as you make more, you can adjust that, but I love starting conservative. Get those gains in. Put that in now, and you can always dial it back later.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:05)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:06)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0How’s that sound?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:07)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:07)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s really exciting. It sounds really doable.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Totally doable. Totally doable. Remember that you have a lot of time to compound, so I know that sometimes you’ll hear people talking about, oh, later in life. And it’s like, it’s too late to– is it too late? No, no. That money, putting it in now can compound still for 10, 15, 20 years. It can compound for a long time. And really, what is the alternative? To just not put it in?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:42)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That’s like walking out with no bear spray. It’s like, what’s the alternative? You want to get mauled? No, we’re going to do it. That’s the way it works in our household.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:51)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:17:53)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Great. Before we wrap up, George, how can you be sure that your old habits around being fearful of money don’t pop up and derail your journey towards creating a \u200aRich Life together?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:18:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Making sure that I’m communicating openly with Vanessa. Because I think there’s a lot of things that she’ll intuitively do to help keep me on track. But then also, most importantly, is to learn to listen to myself.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:18:24)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Wow.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:18:25)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0So when I react to something, I need to re-look at, why did I react in that way? Where’s that coming from? Because how the hell can I even communicate with Vanessa when I don’t even know where it’s coming from? So I think there’s a lot of personal growth for me around money and life for that matter. Where’s that place I’m reacting from? Once I understand that better.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:18:43)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I like that. I like that. It takes a lot of courage to say that. A lot of honesty. And I find that the older we get, the less likely we are to admit that we don’t know everything. So it’s quite refreshing to hear you say like, „Hey, I actually need to do some work.” I love that. I love your approach. Your attitude is like, „Yeah, I have work to do.” I like that you’re seeing a therapist. By the way, where’s the therapist cost in the CSP?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:19:08)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Oh, it’s covered, 100% covered.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:19:12)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0(Bleep) Canada. I love it. (Bleep) capitalist, goddamn monetized America. All right. Okay. That’s pretty cool. Everyone’s so jealous right now listening. That’s awesome. Good. Okay. Amazing. So I think leaning on your therapist and deciding how often are you going, so building this skillset is like one of the absolute best things you can do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:19:38)\u00a0It’ll be amazing. And maybe you create a couple of little guidelines for yourself, George. One of them could be, from now on, I am going to pause before I answer. And I’m never going to be silent Vanessa asked me something. Because that can be so devastating.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:19:54)\u00a0Even if you’re like, „I don’t understand. I don’t know. This is something that’s making me uncomfortable.” Come up with a few words, put it in your wallet, and if you’re feeling– just pull out the card and look at it. It’s totally fine. Sometimes I literally pull out the wheel of emotion and I take a second to look at it. It sounds like silly, but it works.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:20:11)\u00a0So come up with your own strategies, and your therapist can help, so that you can address and meet Vanessa where she is. You don’t always have to agree, but you definitely have to communicate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:20:23)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0That sounds\u00a0like a conversation I’m looking forward to having as long as fearful Frank\u00a0shows back up.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:20:29)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Yeah. Really love that, honestly. It’s quite obvious to me how much you two love each other. It’s obvious. And couples, we don’t get a lot of chances to spend hours together with somebody else talking about pretty deep stuff. There’s so many different strategies we use, and all of those strategies just leave us disconnected. To see the two of you come back and reconnect is so awesome. It’s why I do this.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:20:56)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0He is my favorite person. He’s the only person I want to work this hard on anything with.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:21:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I love that. Here’s my homework for you both. Really think, how do I want to show up in this conversation? How do I want my partner to show up? And tell them, „Hey, normally when we talk about money, this is the dynamic. After talking to Ramit, I’ve realized I want to show up this way, and I’d love for you to show up that way.”<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:21:18)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:21:19)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Each of you agreeing on the role you want to play, this is how we recalibrate our relationship. Talk about your money. Specifically talk about your vision. Write down all those big three or four things you want to get done. And then start with the most important one of all. What’s our vision?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:21:34)\u00a0When you start there, you can make some quick wins right off the bat. Your accounts are already joint. Celebrate that. Have some Prosecco. You want to transfer some money to start saving a little bit more? Go ahead. Transfer the money. You know you have it. It’s just sitting around getting invisibly absorbed. Get those wins. Lock them in, and then you can start doing the big systemic changes over time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Narration)<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:21:56)\u00a0<\/span><b>Ramit:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Huge thank you to Vanessa and George for being so open today. This was a fun conversation, but more importantly, it’s a perfect example of how couples can have so much going right,\u00a0successful businesses, strong partnership, but they can still get stuck\u00a0when communication breaks down, especially around money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:22:16)\u00a0Vanessa over explains.\u00a0George avoids.\u00a0And yet they run two businesses side by side with ease. That contrast says a lot.\u00a0It reminds me of something I read once.\u00a0I’ll never forget it. A speaker at a conference was talking to someone in the audience who just wouldn’t stop talking about their problems.\u00a0The speaker would ask them something,\u00a0and they would talk, talk, talk, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Oh, this happened. And then that happened.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:22:43)\u00a0And the speaker listened and listened, and finally the speaker said,\u00a0„I think you talk a lot so that you don’t have to sit with yourself and listen.”\u00a0I thought, damn, that is it.\u00a0That is such a pattern that I see when people have huge problems.\u00a0They will often talk, talk, talk, talk, talk\u00a0to distract themselves from the quiet reality of what the real problem is.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:23:10)\u00a0We overcomplicate things to avoid confronting what we need to, because chaos gives us something to do. It gives us meaning.\u00a0I\u00a0got to\u00a0work against that. And what about that? And they didn’t do this.\u00a0He didn’t do that. And I think that’s part of what’s been going on here.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:23:25)\u00a0Both of them caught in these decades long habits that feel familiar even when they’re exhausting and they’re not working. Changing that dynamic, of course, is very hard, but something shifted today.\u00a0When I asked them to focus on just three key things,\u00a0they did.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:23:40)\u00a0They cut through the noise.\u00a0They got clear. They started to sound like a team.\u00a0And my hope is that they keep that momentum going.\u00a0With the help of their therapist and each other,\u00a0I’m confident that they can.\u00a0Now check out their follow-ups.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:23:55)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Hey,\u00a0Ramit and team.\u00a0It’s George calling.\u00a0Just following up. Just talking about the interview that we did earlier–<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:24:00)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0 As soon as Ramit understood what was going on, he was really able to be that neutral third party that I was looking for to really break through the ear blinders that George had on when it came to our conversations around money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:24:14)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0One thing that I was really aware of is how closed I was, how shut down I was, and not able to talk about it.\u00a0Not\u00a0being\u00a0able to articulate my feelings around money, and\u00a0not being able to really express the amount of frustration and stress that I do have with money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:24:31)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Ramit was able to call us both out in a firm and loving kind of way that we were both over explaining things,\u00a0and just to be super direct with one another and just get to the heart of the matter, which I’m now working on with my therapist in my one-on-one therapy and that George and I are\u00a0going to\u00a0work on together in our couples therapy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:24:50)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0It’s allowed me to go,\u00a0„Oh,\u00a0I’m shutting down.”\u00a0And being able to look at myself and go,\u00a0„Well, why?”\u00a0And I think that what\u00a0it’s done is revealed the fact that I need to start talking about those things with Vanessa,\u00a0coming up with more solid plans, but being open.\u00a0And some of those things about opening up\u00a0is saying that I don’t know,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:25:10)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0 The very first thing that happened, as soon as that call ended, George and I were immediately more connected.\u00a0And we’ve been benefiting from that in every conversation, not just around money since then. So I think the biggest benefit for us is that it’s brought us closer together. We can be more honest and direct, and we are getting better at trusting each other around matters of money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:25:30)\u00a0<\/span><b>George:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0I’m grateful for the opportunity. Thank you for some of the tools that you’ve given us.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(01:25:35)\u00a0<\/span><b>Vanessa:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Our relationship is already better for it,\u00a0and so are our finances. So big love. Thanks so much,\u00a0everybody.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script>\n!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)\n{if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\nn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};\nif(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';\nn.queue=();t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\nt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)(0);\ns.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window, document,'script',\n'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\nfbq('init', '259290718675278');\nfbq('track', 'PageView');\n<\/script><a href=\"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/212-vanessa-george\/\"> Nuoroda \u012f informacijos \u0161altin\u012f <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\ufeff Vanessa (48) and George (59) have been married for five years and run two businesses together, but still keep their finances separate, leading to recurring tension, resentment, and financial instability. Vanessa is a risk-tolerant entrepreneur who sees money as a tool for growth. George is nearing retirement, risk-averse, and clings to financial security. They […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":585,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[4274,4190,4271,4273,4275,4272],"class_list":["post-2191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sekmes-istorijos","tag-allso","tag-episode","tag-hes","tag-losing","tag-shes","tag-terrified"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2191"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2191\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sekmesreceptas.lt\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}