134. “I make $24K a year but my truck costs $1,600+ a month” (Part 2)
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Before we start today's show, I have a really exciting announcement that I've been wanting to share for a long time. On January 1st, 2025, I'm releasing a new book called Money for Couples. For the last three years, you've heard me on this podcast speaking to different couples every single Tuesday. I've spoken to over 170 couples on this show about their money psychology, the money messages they heard from their family, the peculiar dynamics that they have around money and where they get stuck.

and how they can get on the same page. Well, behind the scenes, I've been working on the definitive book to help couples get on the same page with money, and that's what I wrote for you. It's coming out January 1st, and in the book, I'm going to share how to talk about money, including the exact words to use, when to talk about it, how to teach your kids about money, even the exact agenda and account setup that my wife and I use in our finances.

I'm going to show the tactics to make instant improvements, like how to set up your accounts to automatically work together and how to assess your financial health.

And finally, you're going to get a deeper understanding of money psychology in your relationship. And you're going to discover why you and your partner see money differently and how to get on the same page. Now, it's one thing to listen to couples or watch couples every single week. I love doing that for you. But it's a whole different thing to be able to have the book and to be able to work through it with your partner. Okay?

I'm so excited to get this book in your hands. You can pre-order it using the link IWT.com slash money for couples and stay tuned for a lot more on this book this year. Again, go to IWT.com slash money for couples to pre-order my new book about getting on the same financial page as your partner. You know, money doesn't have to be boring. I get a lot of questions of people who have set up their accounts who have money being saved and they're like,

What now? What's next? How am I supposed to design my rich life? That is why I created the journal. The journal is something you can do either on your own or with a partner. Imagine yourself 15 minutes in the morning. You have a

cup of steaming tea, and you're sitting down following the prompts that help you envision what your rich life is. What's your perfect week? What's your perfect month, year? This journal is designed as a no numbers journal. It's not technical, but it's going to help you understand what you truly value and also what you don't care about.

I recommend you pick up a copy of this journal. You can do it solo or with a partner, and it will help you design your rich life. Get it at any bookstore now. I mean, I'm nervous about the financial stuff. I don't want to do that the rest of my life. I always have a credit card. I don't ever know where the money went. I always just kind of climb up a ladder for no reason. It feels like I am in a position where...

One, I am having to prove myself, like, that I'm worthy of being a partner, that I have to show him that I can be responsible with money in order for him to want to build a life with me. I feel like the root of the problem is that, like, I don't have a good, a really good sense of, like, who I am. Like, I feel very lost. I don't know. Like, it's my fault. Like, I'm not worth anything.

marrying. Welcome back to part two of my conversation with Becky and Dustin. Just to remind you, at the end of the conversation last week, I found out that Dustin made $24,000 last year, and yet he bought an F-350. That's a huge truck with six tires. And I hit my hand on the desk because I was cracking up so much, and the video cut out. That's the first time this has happened in over 100 episodes of this podcast. So we're back.

And as a refresher, Becky wrote the application to me. She's frustrated because she moved across the country, moved in with Dustin. She's frustrated that their money is separate, frustrated that he doesn't seem to have money to renovate the house, which is important to her, frustrated that he hasn't proposed. But Dustin is frustrated because Becky is not keeping up her end of the bargain and paying off her credit card debt as she agreed to. Before we dive into the episode, look back on this year.

How well do you think you lived your rich life? I think at this time of year, it's natural to start thinking about our New Year's resolutions, but often we miss an important step, which is to look back on the year and think about what we loved, what we wish we had done more of.

I call this an annual Rich Life Review, and my wife and I do this at the end of every year. Our Rich Life Reviews have helped us make amazing plans for the upcoming year, like spending months living in New York, traveling, being more generous, and just getting control over our money. This Saturday, December 16th, in my newsletter, I'll be sharing how to do a Rich Life Review, and you can only get it by signing up at iwt.com slash podcast newsletter. Here is Becky and Dustin.

All right. Now, listen, I did a little research, OK? A lot of truck guys out there. I'd like you to know that I know what a dually is now. Like, that's what you see on Yellowstone. They're hauling around like 10 horses. Is that true? I mean, that is what it's for. OK, I love that big smile on your face. Like, yeah, that's what it's for. And then what do you haul in your truck?

So like skid steers, excavators, materials. Well, I don't even know what any of that is. What's this? What is an excavator? Heavy machines that dig swimming pools and just earth moving equipment. All right. This is not getting me the answers that I thought I was going to get. But all right, fine. You got the F-350. Since we talked, which you filled it up with 200 bucks of gas on Monday, how much have you put into it since then?

Oh, shoot. That was probably two Mondays ago and I just filled up and it was like 180. 180. Okay. Okay. All right. That's a lot of money. What do you do while you're filling up the gas for like 25 minutes each time? What do you do while it's there pumping? Cry. All right. So I still don't understand how somebody can afford a $65,000 truck on a $150,000 gross income.

So that was, that's, uh, that's net what I brought. That's my money. What? That's not what the whole business made. That's just my portion of it. That's all the profit. 150 you made. Yeah. Last year. Yeah.

- That's different than what I see on this thing. - I mean, I own the business, so yeah, I mean, I made it. It's my money at the end of the day. - And where is it? - This is the problem. - In the business account, and I took some of it last year. - How much?

I don't know. Am I being punked right now? What the hell is happening? This is the problem. This is why when we sat down to split our finances, he doesn't know what's his and what's the business's and he kind of just takes a little as he needs it. More than a little sometimes as I need it or want it. Okay. And then what about when you need to say eat? Used to, I would just use the company card and just eat.

So you're taking the company card, you're like going up to Chick-fil-A or whatever, and you're like, all right, eight bucks. Yeah. Okay. And how does your bookkeeper feel about this? Oh, it's been a fiasco. They don't like that, huh? Oh, that's weird. All right. So you said you netted 150K you. How much did the business make top line or gross? Top line was $499,000.

Wow. How long ago did you start this business? 10 years. Okay. That's impressive. Half a million dollars doing pool installs. And that was in one year? Yeah. So you're making half a million in the last year. And the year before, what was it? The year before, it was probably...

two to two 50, 300 range. I'd have to look, to be honest. Okay. Impressive. All right. And you got a nice profit margin. Okay. You got the truck. Sounds like the truck's necessary. Fine. This is helping me understand what's going on. I got you. No problem. All right. Now you, you yourself, you said you yourself netted one 50. Where's the one 50? Uh,

Some of it's probably still in the business. Some of it's probably in my savings. I bought a Jeep, things like that. Okay. Your savings has $70,000 and of that 67 is yours. So some of it's in there. Oh yeah. Should be. Yeah.

All right. And then spent some of it, I'm sure, bought stupid stuff and went places and lived. Do you mean the Jeep or is there other stupid stuff? There's probably a lot of other stupid things. Okay, we'll get to that. But can we fix this number? Because this is all, you do not make $2,000 a month. That's ridiculous.

I mean, so all this year, all I've done, it automatically drafts to 2000 to cover like my fixed expenses. This is the way that you do it. Okay. We're going to up-level you here a little bit. Let's just say for easy math that you would make a hundred K salary. Let's even say you'd make 150 K salary. Okay. On the open market, that's your market rate. And

And you go, hey, I don't want to pay myself full market rate. I want to pay myself 100K this year. But when I get my business a little bit bigger, I'll pay myself full market rate. Okay, that's how entrepreneurs do it. So you go, all right, I need to give myself. Well, we know exactly how much you need to give yourself because guess who else in this relationship makes exactly $100,000? That's right, Becky. So why don't we go ahead and just literally copy and paste this.

her information. So now you make 8,333. Oh, wow. This actually makes things really easy. Now I'm not saying this is how you got to make your final numbers, but this makes my job a lot easier and I'm all for making my job easier. What do you say? I'm with it. Ramit just copies and paste. And then he calls it a day. He goes, wow, great job, Ramit. See you later. So like right now we're going to say I make $8,300 a month. Okay.

What if I'm not making the money like I normally would? This year, I'm probably going to be close to $250,000. That's a problem. Do I maintain the same $8,000? You need to pick a number that you can confidently deliver on. Okay. All right, watch. Both your gross is $8,333 for a total of $16,667 per month, bringing us to how much is your annual gross household income?

$200. That's a lot of money. Where do you live again? North Carolina. How do you all feel about making a lot of money in North Carolina? Becky probably thinks we don't. No, that's really good. That's pretty good. Why are you looking like that? I guess your reaction was a little, it kind of caught me off guard because it doesn't feel that good sometimes. Oh, it doesn't? No. And how much would feel good, Becky?

I don't know. I guess if I was over the 100 mark, I would feel better. If I was closer to 120 or between 120 and 150, I think I would feel a little bit better. I don't know why. I don't know if that's a number I made up in my head. Yeah, you made it up. What do you see on screen right now?

A calculator? Okay, watch this. I just love what you just said because this is amazing. Watch this. $8,333 and you said, you know, I need to be over 100 to feel good. Can we just look at how much if we add it all up, you make $99,996 per year. You want me to hand you $5 right now? I'll literally Venmo it to you. Will that make you feel better about money?

No, it won't. No. I guess in my head, I always thought when I first started looking into going back to school and I saw the range of income, I think a part of me was like, oh my gosh, I'm going to make a hundred grand a year. That's a lot. I feel like growing up in the late 80s, early 90s, it was like, you made six figures. And I guess now having it,

And I still feel like I'm broke most of the time. And again, the logical part of me understands that I'm broke because of my actions, what I do with my money, not what's coming in. There's still just that piece of me that's like, if I just made another one or two grand a month, it would just make such a huge difference. Can you put that cup down for one second? Yeah, I'm sorry. That's okay. That was my emotional safety cup. That's okay. So you just said, with my head, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Put your hand here. Tell me what you feel about your money right now. $99,996 per year. What do you feel? I think I feel a little embarrassed. Keep it there. I feel ungrateful. Ungrateful to whom? Myself. Okay, keep going. I feel, yeah, I just feel like I'm very fortunate. Yeah.

to not only probably make that kind of money, but make it doing something that I genuinely enjoy. And that the only thought I have about it is if I had more, I'd be happier. Wow. That's honest. Thank you. I think you ever realized that before? Not that specifically. I know I struggle a lot with just gratitude in general. It's like something I know is really hard for me or that I know causes a lot of

my own self-inflicted issues, but I didn't realize I specifically felt that about what I make. - Seems to me a lot of what's going on here is about how both of you feel about money, individually and with each other. - Yeah, 100%. - I'll suggest some things that I've observed just in this conversation about money. Becky, I think that Dustin doesn't trust you with money if we're just cutting to the chase. - Yeah. - And I think that Becky

He has some legitimate reasons not to trust you because you overspend and you haven't told him about the spending problems for a long time. Stop me if I'm wrong, please. I want to make sure that I'm not saying anything that's inappropriate or inaccurate. Becky, your thoughts? Fair. That's fair. Dustin? Yeah, I feel like that's fair. When we first met, she said, I'll just give you all my money and you take care of it. She doesn't believe she's good with money. Exactly. Becky, do you see...

These feelings of self-worth, of connection, of do I need to prove myself? They're deep. Nothing we can tackle on one call, but something that you will work on for many years and it will be worth it.

There's so much for Becky to dig into here. Personally, I love the opportunity that she's going to get to discover more about herself and her own behavior. What a gift to get to study the most interesting person in the world, yourself. That's the way that I want us to all think about self-development, whether it's coaching, books, podcasts, therapists. This is an opportunity. It's a gift to learn more about herself. So I'm excited for Becky.

It's also important because the way that she talks about money and behaves with money and feels about money is being colored and distorted by the way she sees the world. And that includes her own self-worth. I really want her to tackle these things because as you heard from her comments about feeling good about money, if she made a hundred K quick reminder, she makes $99,996.

It's just not true. And much of this is not simply a money problem. It almost never is. We'll be right back.

You know how many people's conscious spending plans I see every week? What's fascinating is the categories of spending, especially the ones where people spend way more than they think they do. For example, subscriptions. Let's take a look at some recent numbers on how much people spend on subscriptions. $100 a month on subscriptions. $205 a month. That's from someone spending 76% of their take home each month on fixed costs.

$211 a month, $147 a month, and $487 a month. This is literally thousands of dollars a year, and most of us have forgotten about all the subscriptions we are actually paying for.

Thankfully, this episode's sponsor, Rocket Money, can help you easily find and cancel those unwanted subscriptions. Rocket Money monitors your spending and helps you lower your bills so you can grow your savings. Rocket Money will even try to negotiate lower bills for you by up to 20%. Just submit a picture of your bill

and Rocket Money takes care of the rest. They'll even deal with customer service for you. Rocket Money has over 5 million users and has saved a total of $500 million in canceled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year when using all of the app's features. Stop wasting money on things you don't use. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions by going to rocketmoney.com slash Ramit. Give it a shot at rocketmoney.com slash Ramit. That's rocketmoney.com slash Ramit.

My team and I create tons of material every single day. Scripts, voiceovers, emails, all kinds of material that we need to be good and we need it to happen fast. And one of the things we use is Grammarly, especially their new AI tool. For example, every Saturday, we send out my podcast newsletter. I break down an anonymous person's conscious spending plan. And I like going really deep to break down the numbers and show you things you might have missed in your own finances.

Well, guess what? That is a lot of copy. Before, it would take my team a ton of time to work through everything I had written and edit it and make it right for email. Now, Grammarly does it for us in seconds. Grammarly Premium actually gives us suggestions on how to make our writing more impactful for you. It identifies gaps in the writing and shows personalized suggestions to improve the whole thing. And it can even add images like that.

Save time with one click and go from editing drafts in hours to seconds. Get AI writing support that works where you work. Sign up and download for free at grammarly.com slash podcast. That's G-R-A-M-M-A-R-L-Y dot com slash podcast. Easier said, done. Now back to the show. All right. And then down here, we got guilt-free spending.

So this is where the lies happen. How is it possible, Becky, that you went on all these trips and you're telling me you only spend $500 a month on this? Yeah, I probably just added my monthly guilt-free spending, things that are on automatic. I don't think I went back and looked at like... Well, we're definitely not accounting for all your expenses here, which is a real problem. And I suspect, Becky, that's probably where...

a lot of some of the issues lie. How do we start actually getting accurate numbers here? Yeah, I guess when I was doing it, I was just thinking what comes regularly. I didn't even think to add up. Holiday trips, anniversary, vacation, one-off expenses, mistake fees, all that stuff. Yeah. Well, let me tell you something, Becky. I think this is important. One of the reasons you feel anxious about money, among others, is that

Essentially, your fixed costs are 71%, which is a lot. And that means by the time we get down here to your guilt-free spending, you actually, according to the math, only have 500 bucks a month to spend. And so you know what you're doing is you're basically like, I don't care about that. I'm just going to spend what I want. Right? Yeah. And then how does that make you feel? Anxious. So what do you want to do? I guess I have to get my...

fixed costs more comfortable and i probably need to be more aware of like my guilt-free spending i think that's right what if you got like once you pay off your credit card you'll have a thousand bucks right there yeah which was the whole the hope right but i mean i have to get there which i mean shouldn't take very long you don't do you know

No. I mean, I have to do the math. Should we just do it right now? Sure. How much do you owe on credit cards? I thought it was like seven something. Yeah, seven. Just under seven. And how much are you paying towards those? I mean, I guess I'm kind of taking the dust on a project. I try every paycheck to put four or five hundred a month or a paycheck. Excuse me. Do you try to brush your teeth in the morning? Try? No, I do brush my teeth. Okay. Yeah.

So then why are you trying to pay off your debt at a certain amount? It's actually easier to automate your debt than to brush your teeth. What does the word try have to do with paying off debt? I mean, it doesn't. Why would you set it up automatically? I think when I went to do it, I was like, well, I'm going to put it at this amount. And then I had it there for a month. And then that made me nervous because then I was like, you know, there was already one time where I was like, when the payment was about to come, I didn't have the money. So I was like, I'll just do it when I get paid every time, every payday.

Why didn't you have the money? You get paid the same amount every month. Because I had already spent it on something else. Guilt-free. Guilt-free. Right, Becky? Yeah. That's true. You had spent it on something that was guilt-inducing, but part of the guilt-free category, you're not paying yourself first. Paying yourself first is talking about savings and investment, and your debt at 27% is draining everything else from you.

So we got to pay that stuff off first and whatever's left. That's why it's at the bottom. Guilt-free spending is at the bottom of the CSP because that comes last.

Okay. Let's look at this. Your monthly payment, you're paying for a thousand dollars a month. You're trying to, which I don't like trying. I'd rather have you automate $800 a month instead of trying to do a thousand. I don't want trying at all involved. I just want it to happen. All right. Let's look at this. I'll do a little calculation here. 7,000 bucks is your balance. I'm going to say 27% on your interest rate because it's probably around there. There's zero right now.

Really? For how long? For another six, until next July. So like six, seven months. All right. Okay. That's cool. Well, we'll put that in. Let's see what happens. And you're paying a fat wall. This is going to be really good news. So you're going to pay it off in seven months. If you pay $1,000, it's just simple math. Okay.

But I want to show you what happens if it's 27% interest, which by the way, if you don't pay it all off, they might retroactively go back and charge, which we do not want. Okay, that'll take you eight months. It's not a huge deal, but you would pay 700 bucks in interest. That would suck. And let's say you end up like sort of doing it, but sort of not. Some months you do, some months you don't. So it ends up being 500 bucks a month. You want to see what happens?

It sucks. 18 months to pay this stupid debt off and you pay over $1,500 in interest. What do you notice, Becky? A lot. Yeah. So what's the conclusion? Just commit to the $1,000 and be done with it. Correct. You want to set it up automatically right now? Sure. What's stopping you? I want to make sure I'm not pressuring you into anything.

Nothing. I can do that. I can do that. Do I do 500 on each of them? I have two credit cards. Or do I do 1,000 on one until it's paid off? Okay. Don't confuse yourself. Hold on. Just listen to me. Listen to me closely. What's the balance on each of them? One is 3,000 and one is 4,000. So does it really matter? If you have 0% interest, so that's not a factor. You have seven months to pay these off.

So both of them are going to be paid off at $500 a month, right? Yeah. Becky got there a lot faster than I did, but we're both here. We're ready to click it. Go ahead. Set up automatic payments. Read it to us, Becky. Set up automatic payments for your credit card. Wow. Round of applause. Take the win. What do you say? Becky, how do you feel right now? Fine. Wow. All right.

Well, one of us had a good time. All right. Dustin, how do you feel? Great. All right. We got another one, Becky? Yes. Go ahead. I don't want to pull this one up for you. Not because of the amount, but because of where it's from. BankofAmerica.com. Wow. Wow.

Wow, I couldn't script it better. This is one of my least favorite banks, second only to Wells Fargo. I can't wait for Becky to pay this debt off and close her account so B of A loses yet another I Will Teach You To Be Rich customer. I mean, it feels like a little bit of a weight off my shoulders. Just like that's just what it is and that's where that's going to go and I don't need to think about it. Right. All right. And come June, July, when that's paid off,

What are you going to do? What's going to change in your numbers? Oh, I mean, $1,000 is probably going to go to 50%, 55% maybe. What will that mean for you? I'll have more guilt-free spending or more money to save, probably more money to invest. She means spending. I mean, you don't need to lie to me. It's your money. It's not going to affect me. I want you to choose. You're going to do what you're going to do. All right, so we're going to take this down to 400. Your fixed costs are now 53%.

Now that we're looking at her numbers without the debt payment, things feel a lot better. We increased her guilt-free spending, increased her investments and her savings goal, but you'll notice that she still doesn't feel good about money. We'll be right back after this. One of the worst feelings in life is feeling stuck.

You hear it sometimes with podcast couples here. They feel stuck around their money. I felt stuck in my business. I had made a bunch of decisions years ago and I woke up feeling trapped. So after thinking about it, feeling stuck, not sure what to do, I went to a CEO council that I'm a part of and I just laid it out. And after listening to me, they were like, oh, it's so obvious. You need to change this, move this person over here, change this resource allocation. Boom.

I wish I had done it years earlier. If you feel stuck in your career and you also wish you had a group of peers who could help you get unstuck,

help you accelerate your career, then I'd like to invite you to check out this episode's sponsor, Sidebar. Sidebar is an exclusive, highly curated leadership program where you can tap into a group of supportive peers, including Fortune 500 executives and innovative startup CEOs. You can get expert advice, new perspectives, and most importantly, raw feedback, which is so rare on how you can get unstuck.

When you become a member, you get matched with a group of eight to 10 peers. Then you meet with your group twice a month for 90 minute facilitated sessions and have real time messaging access to the entire community. Learn more at sidebar.com slash Ramith.

and join thousands of top senior leaders from companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta who have taken the first step towards accelerating their careers. That's sidebar.com, S-I-D-E-B-A-R.com slash R-A-M-I-T. When I was in my early 20s, I was not into clothes. I wore free t-shirts from tech companies, and I really did not want to seem like I tried too hard.

But I started to realize that clothing is the first thing people see about you. They don't see how nice I am or how much I know about personal finance. They see what I'm wearing. And like it or not, that shapes a lot of how people perceive you.

Now, I take a lot of pride in the clothes I wear. And I love knowing that when I buy something, I'm going to keep it for years and I know that the people who made it were paid well. I actually hired my wife, who runs Next Level Wardrobe, a luxury personal styling company, to style me for my Netflix show and all of my events, including what I wear day to day for more casual outfits.

If you're a professional who wants to dress better, maybe you recently got a promotion, maybe you've gone through body changes, or maybe you're just tired of wearing the same clothes you wore in your 20s, I recommend you check them out. When you hire them to work with you virtually or in person in New York, they'll help you clean your closet, buy the right items with the perfect fit, and they'll help you put together polished outfits you can wear to work.

You'll be able to open your closet every single day and know exactly what to wear for every single event. They'll help you look like an elevated version of you. And they work with professionals of all ages and sizes. I love the convenience. Next Level Wardrobe has over 125 star reviews from happy clients and they've been featured in the Wall Street Journal. Take their free styling quiz at nextlevelwardrobe.com slash Ramit.

Elevate your style using Next Level Wardrobe at nextlevelwardrobe.com slash Ramit. That's nextlevelwardrobe.com slash Ramit. Now, back to Becky and Dustin. I feel like this is the responsible thing to do. And it will make me actually feel better in this moment right now. I feel a little bit like a little kid who's like,

That's not that much fun money. Tell me what you really feel, not what you think you should be saying. Yeah. I mean, when I look at it, I'm just like, that's going to go really... No, that's not true. When I look at it, I'm like, that's a lot of money. That should be plenty of money to spend and have things that I like and do things we want to do. But there's definitely a piece of me that's like, but I feel like that's going to go really fast. Yeah.

And how would it go fast? Lay it out for me. I mean, it's probably like frivolous things with me. I mean, I don't, you know, I don't, it's not like I have any, it's, I don't know. Dustin would say it's coffee, right? Dustin loves to blame everything on my coffee purchases, but it's probably just mindless. It's not intentional spending. It's just, I just buy things when I think I need them or I want them, but there's no real like joy or intention behind it.

The way you're talking about it, it seems like so insulting to yourself. Like, would you talk about a friend like, oh, it's so mindless and you don't even think about it. It's not even like conscious. Would you say that to a friend? Probably not. So why is it so easy to say it to yourself? I mean, I've mastered self-criticism over the last 42 years, I guess. Yeah. And does it get you anywhere? I mean, sometimes I feel like it's, I've, you know, accomplished something.

A lot of things probably by telling myself I should do them or should be somewhere, but not particularly. I hate that word should. Yeah. I tell my patients not to shit all over themselves all the time. Oh, so you have really good advice that you tell them, but you just don't do it. Yeah, all the time. What I hear from you is a lot of self-deception. And it makes me sad because for me, if you want to make a change with your money,

One of the first things that you have to do is accept what you have been doing and deeply understand why. So when I ask, like, hey, how do you feel? If I were you and I was looking at this, I would say, I feel like a little child, which you said that felt really true. I would say, I feel like this is going to be no fun.

I'll say, I feel like I can't do this. I feel like I'll be able to do this for two months and then I'm going to go right back to where I was. And I don't know if I believe in myself to be able to do what's on this page. Yeah, that probably feels more accurate. But you gave me all these other things. I probably should do that. It's probably responsible. Why'd you give me that? I noticed you're crying as we're talking about this. Probably because I'm probably a little bit of a, I don't know, I guess I'm a little bit of like a

like cater or like have people please her like i i'm pretty good at giving the right answers or saying what i think people want to hear you're not here to impress me why are you here you wrote the application i mean you you have the application here well for me i thought you were going to be a lot harder on dustin i didn't know i know you did um yeah i mean because i want to change i i you know it's like i have good self-awareness in some ways like i

I know that like, that's the problem. I know that I overspend. I know I do all these things. I just, I feel like the root of the problem is that like, I don't have a good, I don't know. I have a really good sense of like who I am, which sounds so lame at 40 years old, but like even like trying to go through the workbook and stuff, like what sounds perfect or, you know, it's just like,

I don't know. And I think that's probably why it's kind of triggering that I'm just so surrounded by Dustin's house and Dustin's life and Dustin's family because it's just, I feel very lost. So I think sometimes the spending is not very intentional because I don't really know what really lights me up or brings me joy. Like, what am I missing?

Why am I not happy if I just had $4 more or $4,000 more? If only X, Y, Z, maybe it's Dustin, maybe it's this house or is it me? Yeah. What have you done as you hear these, these voices in your head, you see these feelings, they kind of circle once in a while. What do you do when you feel those things coming close? I mean, I don't know. I guess I probably, sometimes I lash out or how do you do that? Like if I,

In your application, you told me that you feel like you have to do everything on Dustin's timetable. And you told me that he had even gone a long time before he said, I love you. How long did he go? Almost four years. I want to mean it. And I'm scared. I mean, I'm nervous about the financial stuff. I don't want to do that the rest of my life.

Do that means? Live that life. Always have a credit card. Don't ever know where the money went. Always just kind of climb up a ladder for no reason. Okay. And when you say that, you mean...

You don't want Becky to have credit card debt, right? Can we be specific? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I don't want Becky to do that. And that's not like a just for my benefit thing. It's for the team. You know what I mean? Because I know she feels certain ways and there's a lot of stress around every time she signs on every two weeks to look at her debt. Well, maybe she spent more money on it.

And now in the morning, I'm going to be in trouble because I slept in. You find a correlation between the credit card debt payoff and you two getting in fights? Not necessarily, but possibly if I look back and had a calendar of like, and jotted it all down, it might correlate. You know what I mean? Okay. So it's like, that's a life I live when we don't have to. Right. I got you. You're not married. So if we're being honest here,

Each of you cannot control what the other person spends. And so, Becky, what does that make you think? I don't know. We have separate decisions to make. Might it be that you are struggling to make decisions together, but actually it turns out that everything in your life is fairly separate when it comes to your finances? Yeah, 100%.

I didn't know anything about how much he had. I didn't know his business made half as much money this year until five minutes ago. What? What? No, I had no idea that he was going to make half as much money. So that's what I mean. It's very separate and I have no idea at any moment what's going on. And he talks sometimes like we have all this money and we can do all this stuff. And then the next minute he's telling me that

I want all this stuff and I'm going to drain his bank account for things that we've talked about. It's just very confusing. Okay. Well, would you like to ask him some questions to clarify? Because if it's confusing, I'm here to help facilitate. I don't want you to be confused. I think you might not like the answers you get, but at least I want you to have some clarity. Are you ready to get some clarity?

I mean, yeah, that's why I kind of became here, I guess. All right. What do you want to know? Well, I guess first and foremost, why are you going to make half as much as you made last year? Because I didn't sell as many pools because of the COVID times were really great. Do you genuinely feel like you tried hard to sell pools this year? I've tried to sell all the pools that people have called me to sell.

But you didn't do anything to do any marketing. You took all the business that came to you by happenstance, but you didn't do anything. I've never done anything to get to this point. So just because you've never done it, that's okay? If I just told you tomorrow that I'm going to just work 20 hours a week and bring in half as much money, is that okay? Yeah.

No, because my financials are different. Okay. What about next year? I feel like for me, this is a given thing. I could have spent $5,000 and maybe sold three more pools. That's cool. But did it really get me anywhere? No. I've never advertised. I've never spent money on any of that. So I just do what works. But it didn't work this year. Yeah.

If you made half as much as you made last year, then it didn't work. How do you think that makes me feel? Especially when I know we joke about it a lot, but your hours that you work are pretty lax. And so to find out there's other ways to sell and try and make more money than just paying for marketing.

I mean, you said yourself last night, like, you know, you could do fencing or like, I don't know, like that, that doesn't feel good sitting over here knowing that and knowing that you're home every day at three 30 in the afternoon sitting on the porch. Okay. I'm sorry if that's mean, but that's just like, that doesn't feel good. And I understand that, that I'm home at three 30 because I've made half the amount of money because I don't have the work.

And I'm trying to figure out a few other things like where to spend money. Like, do I hire another guy so I can make a bunch of money or do I want to enjoy my life? And like, there's, there's a fine balance. The more money comes, more problems, you know? So it's like, for me, I'm trying to obviously grow and learn. And also nothing about what I made this year has affected anything in our life. Nothing.

So I guess going forward, I mean, like, what are you going to feel comfortable committing? I told you the other day, I told you a couple of weeks ago, I'm probably going to do 4,000 a month. And then I'll write myself a big check. I didn't hear. I told you long ago, whatever you want to put in an account, let's do it. If you got five grand to put in an account tomorrow, let's go put five grand in an account tomorrow. And if we put 50 cent a week in an account, that'll be our money and we'll put it where we want to put it.

I've said that multiple times, like I'm willing to do my portion. I'm not going to bring all of mine to the table to piss it away. I'm not going to wake up in two years and be like, oh, I wonder if we pissed my money away and I wonder where it went. And we don't know because that's what's happened for two years. We've made $180,000 and we have nothing except you live with me in my world that I help facilitate, take care of things.

Try to make your life easier for no for nothing for you to sit here and say you're gonna make half as much money And I step in here for a few is that back and forth more typical of the type of conversations you have yeah, yeah Dustin what would you say is that more typical? It's probably more real we normally don't get that real what I would want from it is to understand why

Me making less has changed drastically our life or something like, I don't understand. What do you want from the relationship? To be a team. But Justin, the way you described it when you were speaking to her was, I don't want to put my money in any more money that's going to be pissed away. Yeah. Nobody wants to be a teammate with someone who approaches money like that. Okay.

Would you, if your partner said, I don't want to put my money any more than this much because it's just going to get pissed away. That's what's been happening for the last two years. That's, I guess I would understand where they were coming from. They don't want to just throw money away. Do you think that there might be a way to say it that can, if you truly want to be a team that might actually make your partner understand you more? There's probably definitely a better way.

- I agree, and I think that the way you said it actually pushes her away. I know it, I could see her body language. Becky, I just want to check in with you. Did that push you away? - Yeah. - I wish I had stepped in earlier. That conversation was frankly a little mean, and I did strongly recommend that both of them see a therapist to help them communicate more effectively. I hear what Dustin is saying, that he wants a partner who is financially responsible.

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I'm trying to give you the tools to be able to actually connect emotionally. Trust me when I say that you getting some spreadsheet together is not going to change anything about your relationship. Do you both see that? It's not the numbers that are stopping you from being connected. Becky could pay off her credit card debt in exactly seven months, which she will. It would not change a thing about this relationship. Dustin could double his business income, would not change a single thing about this relationship. Why?

That's not about the money. I guess that's how I really feel, but I'm probably not good at conveying it, obviously. Yeah. Because that's how I feel. I guess it just makes me anxious just doing it and then not knowing and not having the plan and my understanding and everybody being on board. But what I didn't hear is what you actually want. You're anxious. Things feel bad. But what I heard you is fixating on all the bad stuff and not talking about any of the good stuff. All right.

So if I were on the receiving end of that, I would feel like, oh my God, like, is this relationship even meant to be? Does he want to be in a relationship? All he's telling me is all the things I've done wrong. And I don't hear any love at all. I have no, I hear no care, no nothing. I want you to reflect on that for a minute. Okay. I'm here to help. I'm here because you both showed up. I love that you're both engaged.

engaged in this conversation. And I'm here to help as much as you want me to. I think that there's so much behind what you've said today. If I zoom up, I see a woman who's craving connection, deeply. Connection with your family who lives across the country. Connection with your partner who didn't say I love you for years and who won't talk about money and therefore won't talk about a future together. I mean, it's...

I'm lonely. And the spending? It's probably like the one thing that kind of, I don't know, makes me feel good at the moment. How are you doing, Becky? I'm okay. Stuff is hard to talk about. The least of it is the numbers and cents on a screen, right? Yeah.

What is it? Money reveals so much about us, right? What do you think it's revealing about you and Dustin and your relationship right now? Just that there's like a big disconnect where we're at and where we're going and how we kind of both want to get there. Okay. Where you're at today is what? Let me ask both of you. Today, where you're at is Becky. Separate. Uh-huh. Dustin? Yes. Two individuals, basically. Okay.

And where you're going as on your current state, if you keep going the same path where you're going is where Becky? Not together. Yeah. Seems that way. Where you want to go is Becky together to the team together. How do you want to get there? I mean, I want to, I guess I want to, you know, have like a plan or what. I mean, how do we,

merge together a little bit and not be just two individuals living in the same house um i obviously like want to do a little bit more me stuff so that i can be a little bit more content as myself um so i can be a better contributor to the relationship i think we sit down and like

figure out how we come together. Like, what does that look like money-wise or, you know, what we got to start somewhere. So we just start and have a plan and move together in that plan. Well, um, you guys have me with you right now. So is there a better time than right now? Let's do it. I like you to start by spending at least 30 seconds talking to the other person saying something that has nothing to do with money. Who wants to go first?

I can go. I do love you. I know it took me a while. I 100% believe in you. I've believed in you since I've met you. I admire a lot of things. I don't want to get too emotional. I admire so much about you in a way like I look up to you and wish I could be more like you in many ways. I think you're amazing. I think you...

Live way too much inside of your head to my detriment sometimes maybe and I try to navigate the best we can and you know kind of play my position that and I I truly want to be a team I've told you like We can do it not overnight But we can I can get you everything you've ever dreamed of and most of it that you have it. What's that 30 seconds? I

That's the best thing you've said since we talked, Dustin. Thank you for being so honest. That was amazing. Becky? I mean, it's really nice to hear. It's just not funny, but it's, I guess, kind of sad because everything you just said, I feel the same. I admire you so much and

I try to tell you that all the time about you. You did something that most people can't do and something that I don't feel strong enough to do. So it's like, I admire you and look up to you so much and everything you've done and accomplished. And I just want to be part of taking it to the next level. And I think that we can build something really beautiful. And what I want is you. I want you.

you to open up and I want you to feel safe like being vulnerable and emotional with me and not have to hide behind kind of the silliness and the jokes and like that's what I want from you I want a partner and you know that's that's really all I'm craving and I you know I love you I adore you I'm here and I want to be here and

Because I think we could have a really special life. I believe all that. And I agree. I mean, we can. You two are at your best when you are being honest, when you are sharing what you love about your partner, when you're also admitting that there are things you don't know how to do or things you want to change. You can do all of those things, but you can't do any real changes until you are connected to your partner.

Jumping into numbers, do you now see how trivial it is? Do you see how pointless it is if you're not connected to your partner? Now, the feeling you have about each other, do you think that we can make a plan together? Yeah. Yeah. Because there's a reason. There's a love, and it's out here. You don't need to keep the love secret. If you love your partner, tell him. If you love things about him, tell him. And now that it's out there, now we can make a plan.

I want us to find a way weekly to have a real conversation about... I would really like us to sit down weekly and have a conversation about what the next week looks like and what our plans are and what we want and...

you know, like some reflection time every week. That's like serious. That's not joking. That's not goofing around. That's like, Hey, this is how my week went. This is what was hard for me. This, this is what I want to do next week. Like, I don't know. Like, I, I guess I want to trust myself because then I feel like Dustin will in turn, trust me. You want to trust yourself. I love that. How are you going to do that? By sticking to the plan that we put together. Yeah.

Dustin, take the ball. She's bouncing you the ball now. Go ahead, catch it. And how do you want to respond to that? However that looks, I mean, we go out to eat a few times a week. So maybe one of the times that's what we are doing. I mean,

That's our agenda, kind of. We know we're coming together once a week and we're having that conversation. I love that. Wednesday is every Wednesday. Okay, done. Wednesday at 7 or whatever. Sunday at 4. Is Wednesday at 7 the real number? You pick it right now. I want it to be real. It's Sunday night before the week starts. Ask her. How does she feel about that? How do you feel about that?

I think our weekends get in the way too much. I think we know we eat out once a week and we know that's going to happen. So like, I like, we'll just, let's just make Wednesdays our night out. It's the middle of the week. Um,

We'll just know that's the night we're going to dinner. Let's just make that the day. Love that. And okay, this was so cool. That was so great, you guys. So Dustin threw it back. He said Sunday, which is actually a really common answer for couples. And then I love that Becky was like, hey, I actually don't think that works for us. But why don't we try Wednesday at seven? That was awesome teamwork. And then I love that Dustin was like, yes. And he leaned forward and wrote it down. Right, Dustin? Yeah.

Awesome. Round of applause. That was teamwork. That was fantastic. Take the win. That was awesome. You guys, it sounds so trivial, but that's how we build a partnership together. One decision at a time. I'm hopeful for Becky and Dustin, but I also recognize how difficult their journey will be. The fact that in our conversation, they admitted they have never really said anything positive to each other. That's a tough sign.

The fact that they keep their money separate and have difficulty communicating about it, that's tough. And the fact that they have expectations of each other, but they are not being forthright about them, that's also difficult. But with all that said, I did see glimmers of hope where with a little bit of help, they were able to communicate and say something nice to each other. And you could almost see their partner melt. It's always in there.

The question is, do they have the skills and the desire to be able to connect regularly

when it comes to money and their relationship. And that is what I hope for them. So Becky and Dustin, thank you for coming on here and sharing. Now I'd like to turn it over to their follow-ups, which they sent me shortly after our conversation. We greatly appreciate all the time you spent with us and everything you taught us. Moving forward, doing a whole dinner date once a week, kind of going over everything financial-wise and, you know, in efforts to build a connection and more trust that way.

One of the biggest key things I learned was, you know, how to separate the business from my personal income. So I've kind of know what I'm working towards, you know, personally, so I can enjoy my personal money and that the business is going to be fine. You know, that's kind of a big weight lifted off my shoulders. One of the things I was really surprised by was that

We don't really effectively communicate, so we therefore don't really get to a solution. So, you know, trying to put measures in so we gradually get to our solution and we don't just spin our wheels, you know, constantly not really getting to anything. Really appreciate everything you did for us and taking your time with us and we'll forever be indebted to you for that.

It was a really great experience. It was definitely very difficult, way more difficult than I anticipated. I was just really surprised at how much emotion and kind of, you know, just emotional things were tied into this issue that we've been having that felt like it was over the numbers. And even though I watched the show and listened to the podcast and

You just don't think it's the same when it's you until you're in it and you're getting asked hard questions that I personally have probably been avoiding answering for 20 years. And I just didn't really realize how much my financial behaviors really were driven by this kind of

I guess almost like a little bit of hole in myself that I've had for a long time that I've felt for a long time, but just didn't realize it was manifesting itself that way. So that was definitely really eye-opening and again, difficult, but in a good way. What I learned is that it really wasn't as scary as I was making it. When I sat down and redid the CSP and just looked at the numbers and just, it felt so much better. I just avoided it for so long and that made it

So much worse. And, you know, going forward, I'm going to be able to have the one card paid off by the end of this week. Going to be able to have the other one done by March at the latest. So that's just really exciting. And I think when we looked at that together earlier today, it was just a big relief off of both of us and a really good step in the right direction for us in our relationship. Well, that's as good of a follow-up as I could have possibly hoped for.

Becky and Dustin, thank you for coming on the show. I want to encourage you to get help so that you can connect, communicate effectively, and talk about money and your rich life. I think this conversation was great. And I also think it was just the beginning of your journey together. Thanks again. Thanks for listening to I Will Teach You To Be Rich. I'm Ramit Sethi. Please follow the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you haven't read I Will Teach You To Be Rich, my book,

pick up a copy. You can get it at any bookstore or any library, and it will show you the specific tactics for how to build the I Will Teach You To Be Rich system into your personal finances.