00:00:00
if you're buying a house because you
00:00:02
don't do it run for your life Mr Morgan
00:00:05
H he's the author of the psychology of
00:00:08
money one of the bestselling business
00:00:09
books of this decade he can help anyone
00:00:12
build wealth and change their life the
00:00:14
world is split between people who don't
00:00:16
know how to start making money and
00:00:17
people who don't know when to stop
00:00:19
making money and if you are stuck in a
00:00:21
low-income job you feel like you don't
00:00:23
have the opportunity to generate wealth
00:00:25
but once you realize that opportunities
00:00:26
are available for everybody you can
00:00:28
choose where you want to live what job
00:00:30
you want when you retire because you can
00:00:32
be rich prove it people like Ronald Reed
00:00:35
and he was a janitor what does it take
00:00:37
to amass Mr Reed's $8 million Fortune
00:00:39
he's a fascinating story of somebody who
00:00:41
became Rich despite not having the
00:00:43
skills that you normally associated with
00:00:45
wealthy people then there's Warren
00:00:46
Buffett he's worth $100 billion do but
00:00:48
the real secret to their success
00:00:50
investing my parents are a great example
00:00:53
of this we were very poor no Financial
00:00:55
background and they have like minimal
00:00:56
financial interest but now they'd
00:00:57
probably be in the top 3% of
00:00:59
professional investors if you want to do
00:01:01
well with money you don't need to be a
00:01:03
genius if you have endurance in your
00:01:05
investing you're going to be filthy rich
00:01:07
but when most people say I want to be a
00:01:09
millionaire what they actually mean is I
00:01:11
want to spend a million dollars I want
00:01:13
some nice clothes bigger house the nicer
00:01:14
car ask yourself what is your
00:01:16
relationship with money if your
00:01:18
expectations rise faster than your
00:01:19
income you're never going to be happy
00:01:21
with your money that's the problem so if
00:01:22
I have1 what's the first thing that I
00:01:25
should do I keep it as painfully simple
00:01:28
as I can so
00:01:31
ladies and gentlemen you're about to
00:01:32
meet the man whose book changed my
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entire life as it relates to money and
00:01:37
finance about four or five years ago my
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brother who's a investment banker said
00:01:43
Steve there's one book I need you to
00:01:45
read about wealth investing and money in
00:01:47
finance and he passed me a book called
00:01:49
the psychology of money that book
00:01:52
changed my fortunes it is the reason
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I've been a successful investor and it's
00:01:57
the reason I've been able to hold on to
00:01:59
my wealth and build it it's this man and
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that's the reason why you need to stay
00:02:04
tuned and listen to this
00:02:06
[Music]
00:02:12
episode
00:02:13
Morgan you wrote what I would consider
00:02:17
to be the greatest book on money and
00:02:20
finance ever written I say that because
00:02:23
I remember when I came into money when I
00:02:25
was 25 20 no 27 27 28 years old and my
00:02:29
brother turned to me and said there's
00:02:31
one thing I ask of you he said you have
00:02:34
to read this book called the psychology
00:02:36
of money it will stop you losing all of
00:02:38
the money you've just earned from your
00:02:40
career and it changed my life I've
00:02:42
talked about it for years and years ever
00:02:44
since and that's why I was so Keen to
00:02:46
have this conversation with you because
00:02:47
I really believe if people choose to
00:02:49
listen to this conversation it stands
00:02:51
the chance of changing those two so
00:02:53
let's begin why of all the things that
00:02:56
you could do with your life Morgan why
00:02:58
are you writing books about the subject
00:03:01
matter that you explore what is the
00:03:02
reason well first that's a that's a big
00:03:04
statement that's a lot to live up to
00:03:05
it's kind of scary to hear that because
00:03:07
I've I've often been and this gets to
00:03:09
the why I I've defined it as selfish
00:03:12
writing where I write for an audience of
00:03:14
one and that is me and I like to think
00:03:16
of myself as a pretty selfless person
00:03:18
but for writing I don't try to say I'm
00:03:21
going to write a book for this person or
00:03:22
that person or that audience I write
00:03:25
what I'm interested in and I write it in
00:03:26
a way that I think is interesting and I
00:03:28
try to solve my own problem problems and
00:03:30
then I take a leap of faith that if this
00:03:32
is interesting to me and it's going to
00:03:34
help me maybe it'll help somebody else
00:03:36
that's very different from the
00:03:37
traditional writing style of saying know
00:03:39
your audience know your audience very
00:03:42
quickly turns into Pander to your
00:03:43
audience and I think a lot of people
00:03:45
maybe they don't even know it but if
00:03:46
they read a book and they don't
00:03:47
necessarily like it it's because they
00:03:48
were being pandered to they were being
00:03:50
spoken to in a way that a person would
00:03:52
never speak to them in real life so I
00:03:54
just this is almost like my diary I
00:03:56
think in terms of these are the topics
00:03:58
that I found interesting for myself and
00:04:01
so I guess that's the why I feel like
00:04:03
I've really found myself in a career
00:04:05
where I can just figure out my own
00:04:06
problems and try to figure out what I
00:04:09
think and what's interesting to me and
00:04:11
then kind of put it out to the world and
00:04:13
then hope that other people will enjoy
00:04:14
it let's start with the psychology of
00:04:16
money what is the benefit to my life if
00:04:17
I understand the things that are written
00:04:19
in the psychology of money well let me
00:04:21
start with I think most Finance books
00:04:24
will their their answer to that question
00:04:26
would be when you're done with this book
00:04:27
you will know how to pick stocks better
00:04:29
you will know how to balance your
00:04:30
checking account or what credit cards
00:04:32
that you should use for my book I think
00:04:34
when you're done with it I hope that you
00:04:36
will just look in the mirror and say who
00:04:39
am I which is kind of what I did with
00:04:41
this trying to figure out who I am and
00:04:43
what I want and why I was insecure why I
00:04:45
wanted to show off to other people the
00:04:47
car that I drove so if you become more
00:04:50
introspective about who you are and what
00:04:52
you want out of life and what money can
00:04:54
do for you and cannot do for you and
00:04:56
become a little bit more introspective
00:04:58
about why you think
00:05:00
about where you are in the social
00:05:02
hierarchy and greed and fear and why you
00:05:04
think about these things that you do I I
00:05:07
honestly think that I I I hope at least
00:05:09
because it was this way for me that when
00:05:11
you're done for with the book that's
00:05:13
kind of when the learning begins because
00:05:15
maybe this will just spark a bit of
00:05:18
curiosity for you to then go for a walk
00:05:20
and think about what you want out of
00:05:22
life and whatnot so I think most books
00:05:24
when you're done with the last page the
00:05:25
learning is done this I hope is just
00:05:28
sparked something in you that will get
00:05:29
you to think more clearly about what you
00:05:31
want with money and what money can and
00:05:33
cannot do for you part of that journey
00:05:34
of understanding what you want helps you
00:05:37
to define the word on the front of this
00:05:39
book wealth what is your definition of
00:05:42
wealth well I I I made up these
00:05:44
definitions in the book so these are
00:05:46
just my things that I made up but I
00:05:47
defined rich as you have enough money to
00:05:51
buy what you want to pay for your
00:05:52
mortgage to make your car payment to go
00:05:54
out to dinner with your friends you have
00:05:55
money in the bank wealth I think is very
00:05:58
different wealth is money that you did
00:06:00
not spend and maybe you will not spend
00:06:03
so wealth is hidden it's the money that
00:06:05
you didn't spend on a car it's the money
00:06:07
that you didn't spend on a big house you
00:06:09
didn't spend on jewelry and that's
00:06:11
really important because wealth that's
00:06:13
saved up the unspent money is what gives
00:06:16
you Independence and autonomy and just
00:06:18
the ability to wake up every morning and
00:06:19
do whatever you want with your with your
00:06:21
life and so I think separating that is
00:06:24
really important because when most
00:06:26
people say I want to be a millionaire
00:06:28
what they actually mean is I want to
00:06:30
spend a million dollars that's what they
00:06:32
mean and when I think about being a
00:06:35
millionaire I think it's you have a
00:06:36
million dollars that you're not going to
00:06:37
spend and that because you're not going
00:06:39
to spend it you have this giant cushion
00:06:41
that will give you Independence and
00:06:43
autonomy and so you can wake up tomorrow
00:06:45
and say I can do whatever the hell I
00:06:46
want today I can work for who I want I
00:06:48
can work for as long as I want I can
00:06:50
retire when I want the World is Yours
00:06:52
like every bit of savings that you have
00:06:55
is a piece of your future that you own
00:06:58
it's a you're just buying your time in
00:07:00
the future so that it's yours and you
00:07:01
can do whatever you want with it and
00:07:03
that to me has always been the goal
00:07:05
there's a quote from Charlie Munger
00:07:07
where he says I never wanted to become
00:07:08
rich I just wanted to become independent
00:07:11
and that when the first time I read it
00:07:12
it was like that's me too that's what I
00:07:14
want I don't want a Lamborghini I don't
00:07:16
want a mansion and a yacht I want to
00:07:18
wake up every morning and just say
00:07:20
whatever I want to do today it's mine
00:07:22
nobody's going to tell me where to work
00:07:23
when to work what to do it's all me and
00:07:26
to me for not just work but for your
00:07:29
family life for your health for your
00:07:31
mental sanity there's nothing more
00:07:33
important than that it sounds like
00:07:35
you're talking about your
00:07:36
father my dad it was he has such an
00:07:39
interesting background my my my mother
00:07:40
too their background is so crazy and I
00:07:43
didn't realize how crazy it was until I
00:07:44
was an adult the early part of my
00:07:46
childhood when my parents were in school
00:07:49
we were very poor my parents were
00:07:50
students living off of student loans and
00:07:52
grants we had no money and then my dad
00:07:54
became a doctor when I was 12 or 13 and
00:07:57
things changed it wasn't we were not
00:07:58
rich but like things got very
00:08:00
comfortable and what was really
00:08:01
important is that the frugality that my
00:08:04
parents had to have when they were poor
00:08:06
stuck with them even after they started
00:08:08
making a little bit of money they didn't
00:08:09
buy a Lamborghini no no we grew up in a
00:08:11
very like modest house it was a nice
00:08:13
house and we took some like decent
00:08:14
family vacations but my we always live
00:08:16
well below our means way below our means
00:08:18
did that confuse you because you must
00:08:20
have known that your dad had the money
00:08:21
yes particularly when I was probably
00:08:23
like 16 17 and I could learn like how
00:08:26
much does a doctor make you can go look
00:08:27
it up and figure it out and and then it
00:08:29
was like I definitely looked down on my
00:08:31
parents at that age because I was like I
00:08:34
know you can afford a better car I know
00:08:36
you can buy me better Christmas presents
00:08:38
I know we can afford a bigger house and
00:08:40
you're and you're not doing it because
00:08:42
you're mean I think that was I think
00:08:44
that was my view and then it really
00:08:46
clicked about 10 years ago this is not
00:08:48
that long ago so my dad is an ER doctor
00:08:51
which is one of the most stressful jobs
00:08:52
that you can imagine it's literally
00:08:54
people dying in your arms every day and
00:08:57
he did this for 20 years and after after
00:08:59
20 years of doing this night shifts
00:09:01
children dying in your arms literally
00:09:04
every every week he said he he had had
00:09:07
enough it was it was a lot he put in his
00:09:08
dues he did it for 20 years and he said
00:09:10
I'm done I'm I'm going to retire and the
00:09:12
reason he could do that is because he
00:09:14
had saved up so much money he was living
00:09:16
well below his means they had a very
00:09:17
high savings rate the moment he woke up
00:09:19
and said I want to be done he was done
00:09:21
and that was it and if you contrast that
00:09:23
with so many other people including some
00:09:25
of his colleagues who were also burnt
00:09:27
out at age 60 who were also so burnt out
00:09:30
by having people die in their arms for
00:09:31
20 years they wanted to retire and they
00:09:33
couldn't because they had the bigger
00:09:35
house because they had the nicer car
00:09:37
that I thought that we should have had
00:09:39
when we were growing up and when they
00:09:42
quit and moved on to their next phase of
00:09:45
Life they got so much happier and so it
00:09:48
was like so that this was 10 years ago I
00:09:50
was in you know in my late 20s at this
00:09:52
point I was like now I get it he was
00:09:54
Frugal he saved a lot and that made him
00:09:56
independent and the Independence made
00:09:58
him Happ than any car would have done
00:10:01
made them happier than any big house
00:10:02
would have done so it's like I think
00:10:04
that is one of the keys to happiness
00:10:06
happiness is like the most complicated
00:10:08
topic you can imagine but one of the big
00:10:10
puzzle pieces is independence and
00:10:12
there's been a lot of work on this
00:10:14
studies on this of like one of the
00:10:16
things that makes people really happy in
00:10:18
life is having control over what they're
00:10:20
doing and it's more so the flip of side
00:10:22
of that it's like what makes people very
00:10:24
unhappy in life not having control over
00:10:27
what happens in their future not having
00:10:29
control over their schedule where
00:10:31
they're going to work whether they're
00:10:32
going to get laid off having that
00:10:34
uncertainty is a massive anchor and
00:10:36
waight on your life your health
00:10:39
absolutely I mean that was a big thing
00:10:40
for my dad too he was working night
00:10:42
shifts for for 20 years with this it
00:10:45
it's very bad for your health it's not
00:10:46
great at all so the ability the
00:10:48
financial ability to just wake up one
00:10:50
day and say I'm done done with that is
00:10:53
huge I I was reading studies about this
00:10:55
idea of autonomy because I was trying to
00:10:56
figure out what you have to have
00:10:57
professionally to love your work and I
00:10:59
came up with these five different points
00:11:01
one of them was autonomy and control and
00:11:04
I I came up with that because I read
00:11:06
studies where people who work jobs where
00:11:08
they had a low autonomy and control had
00:11:10
physiological consequences they were
00:11:12
more likely to get disease they
00:11:14
experienced stress significantly more
00:11:15
more likely to have cardiovascular
00:11:17
problems and heart disease which is the
00:11:18
single biggest killer of of people
00:11:20
generally I thought [ __ ] hell just
00:11:21
not having control in your life yeah
00:11:23
makes your body shut down yes you know
00:11:26
this is something that I think everybody
00:11:27
has experienced if they have something
00:11:28
really stress going on at life they get
00:11:30
into bed they're tired you can feel your
00:11:32
heart pounding like the physiological
00:11:35
response of stress is huge it's massive
00:11:39
and if you have that going on every day
00:11:41
for 5 years 10 years 20 years 30 years
00:11:43
forget about it forget about it this's
00:11:45
this great quote from John D Rockefeller
00:11:47
he's the richest man in the world and he
00:11:49
lived till I think he was 99 something
00:11:50
like that he was 97 and his doctor
00:11:53
talked about why like his key to
00:11:55
longevity and the doctor said quote he
00:11:58
never lets any anything bother him he
00:12:01
spends plenty of time outside and he
00:12:03
leaves the table when he's still a
00:12:04
little bit hungry that was his key to
00:12:06
longevity it was just and and when you
00:12:08
read his biography you realize how true
00:12:09
that was no matter what was going on in
00:12:11
his life and the most stressful business
00:12:14
conditions you can imagine none of it
00:12:15
ever bothered him he just had ice in his
00:12:17
veins and he could just keep going and
00:12:19
so I I I do think that's that's
00:12:20
definitely one of like the keys to
00:12:22
physical health is lowering that amount
00:12:24
of stress and there are not many other
00:12:26
things in life that are going to
00:12:28
increase the stress that you have have
00:12:30
than not having control over what you're
00:12:32
doing in life Freedom chapter seven of
00:12:35
your book this is the broadest lifestyle
00:12:38
variable that makes people happy doing
00:12:40
something you love but on a schedule you
00:12:42
can't control starts to feel the same as
00:12:44
doing something you hate psychologists
00:12:46
call this reactants that's right you
00:12:49
know I I do think there are a lot of I
00:12:51
think the best example are CEOs who
00:12:53
might make $30 million a year $50
00:12:55
million a year but they have no control
00:12:57
over their time every single second of
00:12:59
day is planned and demanded by somebody
00:13:02
else and they have to do things that
00:13:04
they don't want to do if they wake up
00:13:05
and they're tired too bad you got to go
00:13:06
to your meetings today they wake up and
00:13:08
they're exhausted too bad you have to
00:13:09
travel to China to close this deal they
00:13:11
have no control over their time and
00:13:13
compare that to someone who makes much
00:13:15
less but they wake up they can wake up
00:13:17
and do whatever they want whatever they
00:13:18
want to do you want to hang out with
00:13:19
your friends you want to sleep in you
00:13:20
want to take a nap at 2 o'clock whatever
00:13:21
you want to do the person who I think
00:13:23
really sticks out in that in that vein
00:13:25
is Warren Buffett who is the the CEO who
00:13:28
makes a zillion a year he's worth
00:13:30
hundred billion do but if you dig into
00:13:32
how he structured his day total control
00:13:34
100% autonomy can do whatever the hell
00:13:36
he wants all day long what he wants to
00:13:38
do is get up and go to work but he he
00:13:41
has delegated things so effectively that
00:13:44
he can do whatever he wants and that's
00:13:45
not only the key to his I think business
00:13:47
success but his health lifestyle success
00:13:51
why he's 93 and still going as strong as
00:13:54
ever I I was thinking about my calendar
00:13:56
when you were talking about the CEO that
00:13:57
makes $30 million a year but is just
00:13:59
dragged around by his schedule sounds a
00:14:00
lot like me to be honest I feel like the
00:14:02
more successful I've got in my
00:14:04
professional career the more my calendar
00:14:07
the minute I wake up in the morning I'm
00:14:09
just like a puppet master to these
00:14:10
little boxes on my Google Calendar yeah
00:14:13
they drag me around the world and
00:14:15
there's very little I actually said to
00:14:17
my assistant about a month ago I was
00:14:18
like um Sophie please can you do me a
00:14:20
favor could you just put lunch in for 30
00:14:22
minutes because I'm not eating could you
00:14:24
just put like could you just put that in
00:14:25
midday every day at the same time so you
00:14:27
can breathe so I can have a little bit
00:14:28
of a moment I do nothing and then also
00:14:30
the other thing I've put in now I have a
00:14:31
personal trainer 7 days a week and I've
00:14:33
just put that in my calendar it was
00:14:35
before then a residual beneficiary as
00:14:37
was everything for me well not for me
00:14:39
because my work is for me but um it it
00:14:42
got the time that was left over when all
00:14:44
my priorities were done and I do reflect
00:14:46
on that and go like how like a when does
00:14:48
that stop because it's clearly not going
00:14:50
to stop when I make money because I have
00:14:51
the money and B how much control do I
00:14:56
actually have and you know what I do
00:14:58
sometimes I think I've noticed about
00:14:59
myself I think sometimes I councel
00:15:01
things just to prove to myself that I
00:15:02
still have control that's great see
00:15:04
that's a good thing there's a quote from
00:15:05
n talb where he says like you are
00:15:07
wealthy when the money that you deny
00:15:09
tastes better than the money you accept
00:15:11
so you get someone comes to you with a
00:15:13
business deal and you say no thanks I
00:15:14
don't want it when that tastes better to
00:15:17
you than accepting the deal it feels
00:15:19
better to you that's like one definition
00:15:21
of of Rich there's another great quote
00:15:23
from TYB where he says the world is
00:15:25
split evenly between people who don't
00:15:27
know how to start making money and
00:15:28
people who don't know when to stop
00:15:30
making money and I think there are a lot
00:15:32
of people that are watching this that
00:15:35
are in kind of our field who are easily
00:15:37
in the ladder they have all the money
00:15:39
that they could ever want to spend or
00:15:40
maybe not not that much but they have
00:15:42
more money than they ever thought they
00:15:44
would have but for every gold that they
00:15:47
hit oh when whenever my net worth is X
00:15:50
all my problems are going to go away
00:15:51
everything's going to feel great and
00:15:52
then they hit X and they just keep
00:15:53
moving the goalpost down and down so I
00:15:55
read in the book that like the hardest
00:15:56
Financial skill is getting the goalpost
00:15:58
to stop moving it's the hardest thing in
00:16:00
the world it's hard for everybody
00:16:02
because virtually everybody thinks if my
00:16:04
net worth or my income was this level
00:16:07
I'll be fine I'll feel great no more
00:16:08
problems I'll wake up every morning with
00:16:10
a smile on my face and then if you're
00:16:12
lucky enough or you work hard enough to
00:16:13
get there you realize it's not the case
00:16:14
at all you're just going to keep pushing
00:16:16
it keep pushing it keep pushing it
00:16:17
forever have they done studies to test
00:16:20
that in terms of analyzing whether
00:16:22
people's goal posts move off into the
00:16:23
future even when they're like
00:16:24
billionaires and whatever I mean here's
00:16:26
here's the broadest way that I would
00:16:28
frame this up that as has been studied
00:16:29
if you look at America today the average
00:16:32
household adjusted for inflation is
00:16:34
making twice as much money than they
00:16:36
were in the 1950s to adjusted for
00:16:38
inflation the average household double
00:16:39
the income that they were back then and
00:16:41
we less happy the statistics that try to
00:16:44
measure happiness over time it's not an
00:16:46
easy thing to do but we're less happy
00:16:48
today than we were back then and this is
00:16:50
why like look can money buy happiness
00:16:52
yes and to some extent does it yes like
00:16:54
people who are in abject poverty are not
00:16:56
as happy as people who are covering the
00:16:58
basics and they have food and shelter
00:16:59
etc etc but over time when you when the
00:17:03
society is getting richer and you're
00:17:05
comparing yourself to other people and
00:17:07
maybe the average American's income
00:17:09
doubled but so did their neighbors so
00:17:10
did their co-workers so did their
00:17:12
siblings so you just automatically
00:17:13
adjust to that I talked about
00:17:15
Rockefeller before Johnny Rockefeller
00:17:17
who died in I think the 1930s he was
00:17:19
worth adjusted for inflation almost half
00:17:21
a trillion dollars during his day
00:17:23
adjusted for inflation but he never had
00:17:26
during his life penicillin Advil
00:17:30
sunscreen polio vaccine keep keep going
00:17:33
down the list of things that virtually
00:17:34
everyone can take advantage of today
00:17:36
that he never had but you can't say that
00:17:39
the average American is living better
00:17:41
than Rockefeller today because we have
00:17:43
all of these technologies that he never
00:17:45
did because we just look at what other
00:17:47
people have and assume that that is the
00:17:49
Baseline so you can imagine a world in
00:17:51
which my kids my grandkids are earning
00:17:55
twice as much as me adjusted for
00:17:56
inflation and they're no happier for it
00:17:58
because the new technologies whatever it
00:18:00
would be that would seem like magic to
00:18:03
you and I will just become their
00:18:05
Baseline and that's always been the case
00:18:07
if there was if Thomas Jefferson or
00:18:10
somebody came to the year 2023 he would
00:18:12
faint at the new technologies and the
00:18:15
medical discoveries that we have and
00:18:17
these are technologies that you and I
00:18:18
don't spend one second being grateful
00:18:21
for because we've just accepted them as
00:18:22
a new Baseline it reminds me of
00:18:24
something in your new book which is out
00:18:26
in November which is
00:18:29
you know I've gassed up a lot of books
00:18:31
on this podcast before but this is one
00:18:32
of my favorite of all time it's just so
00:18:35
easy to read and so engaging because you
00:18:38
you're one of those authors in this book
00:18:40
that realizes the world that the reader
00:18:42
living in and they are busy and they
00:18:44
want the point and they want you to you
00:18:46
know give them not one word more than
00:18:48
you need to it is so brilliant it's so
00:18:51
brilliant um in this book you talk about
00:18:53
exactly that you say the first rule of
00:18:55
happiness is low expectations Y and
00:18:58
that's exactly what you're talking about
00:18:59
is comparison is the thief of Joy
00:19:01
because it just raises our own
00:19:02
expectations right when with that out
00:19:04
the window goes our happiness yeah and
00:19:07
it's it it it seems counterintuitive to
00:19:08
people that if you want to be H for most
00:19:10
people it's if you want to be happier
00:19:11
you need to be ambitious you need more
00:19:13
you need to make more money work harder
00:19:15
have a more successful startup whatever
00:19:16
it would be and there's that's true but
00:19:18
that's half the equation the other half
00:19:19
the equation is keep your expectations
00:19:21
low so the gap between those two it's a
00:19:24
gap between those two that actually
00:19:26
accru to happiness over time how did you
00:19:28
learn that I think it's just I think
00:19:30
there have been a couple little stories
00:19:31
that really stuck out to me one that I
00:19:33
love that just knocked me on my ass the
00:19:35
first time I read it was Stephen Hawking
00:19:38
the late physicist who was without
00:19:40
exaggeration one of the smartest people
00:19:42
to ever walk this planet he was just an
00:19:43
absolute genius and a quirky of course
00:19:46
is that he had a motor neuron disease
00:19:47
and he was paralyzed from head to toe he
00:19:49
had no control over his body he spoke
00:19:51
through a computer not a single muscle
00:19:53
in his body could he actually control by
00:19:54
himself so he was you know
00:19:57
physiologically it's one of the worst
00:19:58
Liv that you can imagine and he did an
00:20:00
interview with the New York Times a
00:20:01
couple years before he died and during
00:20:03
the interview he's talking about how
00:20:04
happy he was and how amazing his life
00:20:07
was and the New York Times said they
00:20:09
asked him they said what is your secret
00:20:10
to happiness like if there's anyone who
00:20:13
has the right to complain about life
00:20:15
it's it's that guy and he's talking
00:20:16
about how happy he was and he said my
00:20:19
expectations were reduced to zero when I
00:20:21
was 21 which is when he got his disease
00:20:24
and he said everything else since then
00:20:26
has been a bonus so this is like the who
00:20:29
whose life is like has ended up in a way
00:20:32
that most people watching that would say
00:20:33
like that's among the worst scenarios
00:20:35
you can imagine and he's probably
00:20:37
happier than you and I because his
00:20:39
expectations were so low that just
00:20:41
waking up in the morning and seeing the
00:20:43
sunrise and getting to go to work and
00:20:45
talk to people was this magical gift I
00:20:48
mean you can imagine not to get too
00:20:49
morbid about this but imagine you're on
00:20:50
your deathbed and the doctor is very
00:20:53
confident that you're going to die
00:20:54
tomorrow and let's say that you make it
00:20:56
one more day what is that Sunrise going
00:20:59
to feel like what's that you know
00:21:01
holding your your wife's hand for one
00:21:03
more day going to feel like it' be
00:21:06
amazing just because your expectations
00:21:07
were on the floor and so it it's always
00:21:10
like that and you go through life seeing
00:21:11
so many people who have everything all
00:21:13
the money the great family all the
00:21:16
health the beauty everything you can
00:21:17
imagine and they're not happy for it and
00:21:19
it's because with everything that they
00:21:20
have their expectations rise not only to
00:21:23
that level they might rise above it so
00:21:25
if you are some if your expectations
00:21:27
rise faster than your inome
00:21:29
you're never going to be happy with your
00:21:30
money no matter how much money you make
00:21:32
you can make a billion dollars a year
00:21:34
but if you needed and wanted 1.1 billion
00:21:36
you're broke you feel broke and the
00:21:39
reverse of that is true too there are
00:21:40
people who make $50,000 a year but if
00:21:42
they only need 40 to be happy they're
00:21:44
sto they feel great and so that's I
00:21:47
think that's one of the reasons it's so
00:21:48
important is because managing your own
00:21:51
expectations is more in your control
00:21:53
than managing your circumstances in
00:21:55
terms of raising your income raising
00:21:57
your investing return
00:21:59
it's not that you can't control raising
00:22:01
your income you can be ambitious and
00:22:02
smart and entrepreneurial of but it's
00:22:04
more in your control to just inside your
00:22:06
head to say I'm going to try to want
00:22:09
less that that's just a mental exercise
00:22:11
that's it's not to say it's easy it's
00:22:13
not easy at all but you have total
00:22:15
control over doing it so how in a
00:22:17
practical sense can one go about keeping
00:22:20
their expectations below their
00:22:23
circumstances I guess here's here's one
00:22:25
that really made an impact on me and
00:22:27
it's great that we're in La cuz that's
00:22:29
where this story took place I was a
00:22:31
valet here in La all throughout college
00:22:33
at a fstar hotel here in town so a I I
00:22:37
was young I was you know aged 19 to 24
00:22:39
or something like that and all day it
00:22:41
was people driving in in Ferraris and
00:22:43
Lamborghinis and rolls-royces and one
00:22:45
day it hit me just I I I remember the
00:22:48
moment because it was like out of the
00:22:49
blue it hit me whenever someone would
00:22:51
drive in in a rollsroyce or something
00:22:53
never once would I look at the driver
00:22:55
and say that guy is cool like wow look
00:22:58
at him he's so cool what I did is I
00:23:00
imagined myself as the driver and then I
00:23:03
thought if I was a driver people would
00:23:04
think I'm cool and I was like wait don't
00:23:06
you see like the disconnect here nobody
00:23:09
cares about the driver but they want to
00:23:11
be the driver because they think people
00:23:12
will then care about them and once you
00:23:14
realize that like the takeaway is nobody
00:23:18
is thinking about you as much as you are
00:23:20
nobody cares about your stuff as much as
00:23:22
you do nobody cares about your car or
00:23:24
your house or your clothes or your
00:23:26
jewelry as much as you do because to the
00:23:28
extent that they're even looking at them
00:23:30
they're looking at your car looking at
00:23:31
your house really what they're doing is
00:23:33
imagining themselves with that nice car
00:23:36
they're not giving you the credit
00:23:37
they're imagining themselves having it
00:23:39
so once I realize like that was the game
00:23:41
that was being played in society once
00:23:43
you once you recognize that's the game
00:23:45
your willingness your desire to show off
00:23:48
plunges and of course I I like nice
00:23:51
stuff I like nice cars I want some nice
00:23:52
clothes I live in a decent house but
00:23:55
once you realize that it plunges and I
00:23:57
think the most valuable Financial skill
00:23:59
that anybody can have is not needing to
00:24:01
impress other people if you don't need
00:24:04
to impress other people that is an asset
00:24:07
on your balance sheet that is worth a
00:24:09
billion dollars because so much of
00:24:11
society as a whole and individual is
00:24:14
just geared towards how can I get other
00:24:16
people's attention how can I show off to
00:24:18
other people how can how can they like
00:24:19
me more I both agree and understand but
00:24:22
agreeing and understanding is different
00:24:24
from being able to do I think at the
00:24:26
society level it will never be it'll
00:24:27
always be like that same as ever it's
00:24:29
never it's never going to move away from
00:24:31
that if you can manage it around the
00:24:33
edges at the individual level it's
00:24:35
massive for your life one thing that's
00:24:36
important here is that if you are a
00:24:39
young person and you're kind of looking
00:24:41
for a spouse a mate a boyfriend a
00:24:43
girlfriend a wife a husband whatever it
00:24:45
would be then your ability to look
00:24:47
really nice and to signal and to kind of
00:24:49
put up your peacock feathers is
00:24:51
important and I get it and I did it back
00:24:53
in the day once you are more settled
00:24:55
down in your career in your
00:24:56
relationships if at that point you are
00:24:58
still hanging on to the desire to
00:25:00
impress other people that's when it's
00:25:01
broken that's when it's just pure net
00:25:03
loss in your life because you're trying
00:25:05
to show off to for people who you don't
00:25:07
even need or want to love you there's a
00:25:10
great quote from Warren Buffett where he
00:25:11
says the definition of success is when
00:25:14
the people who you want to love you do
00:25:16
love you and so for me it's like five
00:25:19
people it's like my parents my wife and
00:25:21
my kids and like that's it that's it
00:25:23
those are the people who I want to love
00:25:24
me and if they love me I I probably have
00:25:27
90% of the happiness that I'm capable of
00:25:30
and if they don't love me and then I'm
00:25:32
never going to have more than like 10%
00:25:34
of the happiness that I'm capable of in
00:25:35
that chapter about happiness you talk
00:25:37
about your friend Brent as well in his
00:25:38
theory on marriage yeah my friend Brent
00:25:40
B sure has this great theory on marriage
00:25:42
where he says marriage only works if
00:25:45
both Partners want to serve the other
00:25:48
partner and expect nothing in return so
00:25:50
you wake up every morning and you say I
00:25:51
want to serve my spouse but I expect
00:25:54
nothing in return from them and if you
00:25:56
both do that simultaneously you're both
00:25:58
pleasantly surprised because what
00:26:00
happens is I didn't expect you to do
00:26:01
anything for me but you did and vice
00:26:04
versa and both of you just wake up every
00:26:05
morning you're like but you did that for
00:26:07
me you you helped me out here you you're
00:26:09
empathetic to me there and it feels
00:26:10
great you exceeded my expectations
00:26:12
exceed my expectations and I think what
00:26:14
breaks down any marriage or career or
00:26:16
whatever it would be is when you become
00:26:19
needy like nothing breaks love more than
00:26:22
being needy and really what needy is is
00:26:25
just your expectations are so high that
00:26:26
you wake up and you say I expect to do
00:26:28
this for me I expect you to help me I
00:26:31
expect you to serve me that's just like
00:26:33
massively high expectations that you
00:26:35
have in that relationship it's it's also
00:26:37
like expecting an external factor in
00:26:39
that case your partner to validate you
00:26:42
in some way or to and that kind of goes
00:26:44
back to your point about money where in
00:26:46
order to stop showing off and focusing
00:26:48
on those five people that we want to
00:26:50
love
00:26:51
ourselves we need to understand and
00:26:54
ideally solve our often toxic
00:26:57
relationship with like our need for
00:26:58
validation and that I guess brings me to
00:27:01
the first chapter in your book where you
00:27:02
talk about the stories of money that we
00:27:04
have and where they've come from and
00:27:07
something that's always baffled me is
00:27:08
when you go into low-income areas
00:27:10
there's more gambling shops yeah and I
00:27:12
can attest to it when I was 18 19 years
00:27:15
old and I'm shoplifting pizzas to feed
00:27:17
myself and I'm doing all sorts of stuff
00:27:20
when I got my student loan in I was in
00:27:21
university for one day and they gave me
00:27:23
like the first payment of my student
00:27:25
loan I don't think I've ever said this
00:27:27
before I put the entirety of the payment
00:27:30
on a bet wow and I lost it in the six in
00:27:33
the an injury time of that football
00:27:35
match I don't bet and did you need that
00:27:37
money for tuition like it it was then it
00:27:39
was then gone I needed it to eat yeah I
00:27:41
wasn't speaking I had no money I don't
00:27:43
come I didn't come from money and my
00:27:44
parents I'd gone to University with 50
00:27:46
Quid and I got this like, sent to me
00:27:48
from student loan whatever I was so
00:27:50
reckless with money when I didn't have
00:27:52
money the minute I got money it's like
00:27:54
everything just chilled the [ __ ] out and
00:27:55
I I became really longterm I made
00:27:59
responsible decisions I stopped buying
00:28:01
flashy things I like don't even own a TV
00:28:03
now I'm very Sim I feel like the more
00:28:05
money I have the less my material
00:28:07
desires are for sure for sure when I say
00:28:09
that out loud I'm like oh absolutely why
00:28:11
is that that when we have less we are
00:28:13
Reckless with our money well I think
00:28:14
there's two sides to this one of my
00:28:16
theories is
00:28:17
that what everyone wants in the world is
00:28:20
respect and admiration from other people
00:28:22
and there's kind of two ways to get that
00:28:24
you can get your respect and admiration
00:28:25
through your wisdom through your love
00:28:28
through your humor or if you don't have
00:28:30
that to offer from the to offer to the
00:28:32
world you're going to get it through
00:28:33
your material possessions so if you can
00:28:36
gain respect and admiration through your
00:28:37
business success your wisdom your love
00:28:40
your friendship great then you're going
00:28:42
to get it and you're going to fulfill
00:28:43
that bucket if you can't get it from
00:28:45
those things then you're like well might
00:28:46
as well show off my car it's all I got
00:28:47
to do that's all I have I think that's
00:28:49
one side of it so as you become more
00:28:51
successful your desire to show off
00:28:54
diminishes because you're gaining
00:28:55
respect and admiration through other
00:28:57
things that are not matural
00:28:58
the other side of this that's so
00:29:00
important is that you know I saw this
00:29:02
statistic years ago that the poorest 10%
00:29:05
of Americans buy like 80% of the lottery
00:29:08
tickets in America and these are people
00:29:10
who can like barely feed themselves
00:29:13
lowest 10% they're literally struggling
00:29:15
to put a roof over the head and feed
00:29:17
themselves are going out hand over fist
00:29:19
buying scratcher tickets and the the
00:29:21
knee-jerk reaction when you hear that is
00:29:24
morons what are you doing you idiot and
00:29:26
maybe that is the right reaction but I
00:29:28
started thinking about it and it was
00:29:29
like okay maybe if you try to put
00:29:31
yourself in those people's shoes maybe
00:29:33
they would say something like this if
00:29:36
you are stuck in a low-income job and
00:29:38
you feel like there's no way out you
00:29:39
feel like you don't have the opportunity
00:29:41
to work your way up the ladder become an
00:29:43
entrepreneur you feel like you're stuck
00:29:45
in this position buying a lottery ticket
00:29:47
might be the only thing in life that
00:29:49
gives you a little bit of hope it might
00:29:51
it's might be what feels like literally
00:29:52
your only ticket to get out and that
00:29:55
might be not something that you and I
00:29:57
feel like because because we have we we
00:29:59
we at least feel like we might have
00:30:00
other opportunities I it's you're so
00:30:02
right because when I gambled what I then
00:30:05
did the same day before the result of my
00:30:08
bet or my lottery ticket came in and I
00:30:10
said this to my team the other day is I
00:30:12
would go on right move and like auto
00:30:14
trader and look at stuff that I would
00:30:16
buy if I won yeah yeah I think there's a
00:30:19
sense too that if you are stuck in a
00:30:21
lower spot in life if you have a feeling
00:30:24
that the world is unfair and very often
00:30:26
it is so some maybe that that might be
00:30:28
the right mindset but if you feel the
00:30:29
world is unfair then it's very natural
00:30:32
to think I might as well cheat too if
00:30:34
the world's unfair why not might as well
00:30:35
cheat and I think that at least at some
00:30:38
level has some explanation for the
00:30:40
relationship between poverty and crime
00:30:42
that word hope is is so is so true I
00:30:44
think it's true too just a glimpse of
00:30:46
Hope because it gives you even if it's a
00:30:48
0.00001% chance if it's the only thing
00:30:50
in your day that made you smile a little
00:30:52
bit made you feel like you had a little
00:30:53
bit of hope then I get why they do it
00:30:55
the other reason the other thing I think
00:30:57
a lot about here is that if you are in a
00:30:59
low-income job and you're working
00:31:01
graveyard shifts and you're exhausted
00:31:03
and you're taking three buses to get
00:31:04
your kids to school if the only thing
00:31:07
that day that gives you a little bit of
00:31:08
pleasure is a cigarette and some alcohol
00:31:11
I get it I totally get it and that's
00:31:13
also the relationship between health and
00:31:15
poverty is a lot of that too so it's
00:31:16
very easy for people who are of higher
00:31:19
means to look down at those people and
00:31:21
point out all the bad decisions that
00:31:23
they're that they're doing in life but I
00:31:25
think you underestimate how much that
00:31:27
desire to just have a little bit of Hope
00:31:29
a little bit of pleasure and if those
00:31:30
feel like your only avenues for Hope and
00:31:32
pleasure maybe that's the explanation
00:31:33
for at least part of it quick one this
00:31:36
is really really fascinating to me on
00:31:37
the back end of our YouTube channel it
00:31:39
says that
00:31:40
69.9% of you that watch this channel
00:31:43
frequently over the lifetime of this
00:31:44
channel haven't yet hit the Subscribe
00:31:46
button I just wanted to ask you a favor
00:31:48
it helps this channel so much if you
00:31:50
choose to just subscribe helps us scale
00:31:52
the guest helps us scale the production
00:31:54
and it makes the show bigger so if I
00:31:55
could ask you for one favor if you've
00:31:57
watched the show before and you've
00:31:58
enjoyed it and you like this episode
00:32:00
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00:32:08
better and better that is a promise I'm
00:32:10
willing to make you do we have a deal
00:32:11
let's speak then to 18-year-old Steve
00:32:14
that was in that little room with the
00:32:15
stack of these what they call County
00:32:17
Court judgments and bays and stuff stack
00:32:19
of letters on his desk what advice based
00:32:22
on all you know about money and finance
00:32:24
can you give to somebody who is Maybe
00:32:28
making a, $1,000 $2,000 a month covers
00:32:32
their rent just about doesn't have a lot
00:32:33
of money left over what is the best way
00:32:36
to go from that position to a position
00:32:38
of wealth in your
00:32:39
view I think one of the best ways to
00:32:42
think about it at the lower levels and I
00:32:44
explained a little bit this earlier but
00:32:45
to dig into it is a lot of what's
00:32:47
probably giving you stress in life is
00:32:49
that you don't have control over what
00:32:50
you're doing and if you view every
00:32:52
dollar of savings that you have as a bit
00:32:53
of your future that you own and control
00:32:56
then I think that mind that mindset can
00:32:58
shift pretty dramatically and it's like
00:33:01
that's that's the ticket out the ticket
00:33:02
out is not a nicer car it's not a bigger
00:33:05
house it's not better closeth the ticket
00:33:06
out is Independence that's what's going
00:33:08
to give you the better career that's
00:33:09
what's going to make you happier it's
00:33:10
what's going to make you healthier and
00:33:11
the only thing that's going to give you
00:33:12
Independence is having enough money
00:33:14
saved up so that you can choose where
00:33:16
you want to live maybe even what job you
00:33:19
want you can choose at at at some point
00:33:22
down the road when you retire if you get
00:33:24
sick it's not just going to break you
00:33:25
immediately having that Independence is
00:33:27
going to take more weight off your
00:33:28
shoulders than anything else you can do
00:33:30
in life save money that's it that's the
00:33:33
the title of that chapter in the book is
00:33:34
save money because you can't put it any
00:33:36
clearer or Starker like that's that's it
00:33:38
he says there are three types of people
00:33:40
those who
00:33:41
save those who don't think they can save
00:33:44
and those who don't think they need to
00:33:46
save yep three types of people which one
00:33:49
are you those who save those who don't
00:33:51
think they can save and those who don't
00:33:53
think they need to save I tell you what
00:33:55
I've been all three in my life that's
00:33:57
interesting I've always been a saver no
00:33:59
I haven't and see that I think that's
00:34:01
actually very rare that you change who
00:34:03
you are really on the nature nurture
00:34:05
Spectrum I actually think and this is
00:34:07
kind of disappointing to talk about it's
00:34:09
not fun to talk about but on the nature
00:34:10
of nurture Spectrum I think a lot of
00:34:11
money is nature Warren Buffett talks
00:34:14
about the people who have the money mind
00:34:16
which means like either they get it or
00:34:17
they don't and if they get it they get
00:34:19
it instantly and if they don't they'll
00:34:20
get it never at all I I I actually don't
00:34:23
believe in it it's that black and white
00:34:24
Charlie merer explains it like that he
00:34:26
says when explaining financial matters
00:34:29
to young people they either get it
00:34:30
instantly or never at all and he's
00:34:33
putting that too starkly I think I don't
00:34:35
think it's that black and white but on
00:34:37
the nature nurture spectrum is it 8020
00:34:39
is it 7030 I think it's probably
00:34:41
something in that range so let me give
00:34:44
you a count a counterargument to that
00:34:46
then so as I said I've been someone that
00:34:49
didn't think he could save because I
00:34:50
didn't have money and I just thought oh
00:34:52
you know but I could have saved in it
00:34:53
looking back now I know I could have
00:34:54
saved I could have saved a small amount
00:34:56
but I didn't see the value in saving
00:34:57
small numbers I didn't understand the
00:34:59
laws of compounding returns which we'll
00:35:00
definitely talk about I have also been
00:35:03
the person that
00:35:04
saves and I've also been the person who
00:35:09
thought they didn't need to save I've
00:35:10
been all three my Counterpoint to this
00:35:12
goes back to a story that I read from
00:35:14
your early years where two of your
00:35:17
friends died on a ski trip yeah and it
00:35:19
also links to something youve said in
00:35:21
your new book same as ever where you
00:35:23
speak about
00:35:24
how sometimes in life like hitting rock
00:35:28
bottom is the greatest incentive to
00:35:31
change our lives yeah so I put those two
00:35:33
things together and go that moment when
00:35:35
you were two of your friends died on a
00:35:36
ski trip that you were on when you were
00:35:38
younger it had an impact on your risk
00:35:40
appetite and your attitude towards and
00:35:42
therefore your attitude towards money
00:35:44
yep what what happened what happened so
00:35:46
I grew up skiing in in Le Tahoe
00:35:47
California and I was a competitive ski
00:35:49
racer right uh so all throughout my
00:35:51
childhood and teenage years I skied six
00:35:53
days a week 10 months a year all over
00:35:55
the world and it was great there about
00:35:57
12 of us on the squad Valley ski team we
00:35:58
had grown up together and we had spent
00:36:00
our entire lives together and when I was
00:36:02
17 this is in 2001 I was skiing with my
00:36:05
two two of my best friends brenon Allen
00:36:07
and and and Brian Richmond and we would
00:36:09
ski out of bounds which is illegal
00:36:12
you're not supposed to do it we would
00:36:13
duck under the rope that says do not
00:36:15
cross and we'd ski out of bounds because
00:36:16
that's where a lot of the good skiing is
00:36:18
and when we would do this it would spit
00:36:20
us out on this back country road where
00:36:22
we'd have to hitchhike back there's no
00:36:24
chairlift when you ski out of bounds you
00:36:25
have to hitchhike your way back so so we
00:36:27
did it one morning in February 2001 the
00:36:29
three of us did it and when we did it we
00:36:31
triggered a very small Avalanche and I I
00:36:34
remembered it so clearly like I can
00:36:36
still feel it 21 year 22 years later I
00:36:40
can still feel what is like it's the
00:36:41
weirdest sensation of that I've had in
00:36:44
my life because when you get hit by an
00:36:46
avalanche rather than pushing on the
00:36:47
snow to gain traction with your skis the
00:36:50
ground is pushing you so all of a sudden
00:36:53
you're skiing along and you got control
00:36:54
and all a sudden boom you have no
00:36:55
control everyore the the ground is
00:36:57
pushing you around probably similar to
00:36:59
what it feels like if you're standing on
00:37:00
the ground during an earthquake like the
00:37:01
ground's pushing you but it was a pretty
00:37:03
small Avalanche maybe came up to our
00:37:05
knees ended pretty quickly and we kind
00:37:07
of like literally high-fived about it at
00:37:09
the bottom and went about our day we get
00:37:11
back around to the the base Lodge we hit
00:37:14
shik back and Bren and Brian said they
00:37:16
wanted to do it again they wanted to ski
00:37:17
again and I said hey for whatever reason
00:37:20
I I I just didn't want to do it so I
00:37:22
said hey rather than hit cheing back why
00:37:23
don't you guys go do it again and I'll
00:37:25
drive my truck around and pick you up so
00:37:28
we said great we made our plans went our
00:37:29
separate ways they went skiing I went
00:37:31
back around to take my boots off and
00:37:33
jump in my truck and go pick them up 20
00:37:35
30 minutes later I go to pick them up at
00:37:36
the pickup spot and they weren't there
00:37:39
and I knew it only took us a minute to
00:37:41
ski down the hill so 20 minutes later I
00:37:43
knew like they they they weren't coming
00:37:44
I I was not worried I figured that they
00:37:46
had already hit hike home but so after
00:37:49
waiting for another 20 or 30 minutes I
00:37:50
just left and I went back to the lodge I
00:37:52
expected them to be there and they
00:37:54
weren't and I still didn't really worry
00:37:56
like we didn't have cell phones back
00:37:57
then and people were just comfortable
00:37:58
being out of touch if you didn't know
00:38:00
where your your buddy was like wasn't
00:38:01
that that wasn't that big a deal so we
00:38:04
went about the day I I started worrying
00:38:06
a little bit I remember I stopped at
00:38:07
Brendan's house and expected him to be
00:38:09
there and he wasn't there either and I
00:38:11
remember calling and leaving a message
00:38:12
on his voicemail and I remember ending
00:38:14
the voicemail by saying I hope you're
00:38:15
okay man those are my last words I
00:38:17
remember that very clearly the day went
00:38:19
on and I think at about 4 or 5:00
00:38:22
Brian's mom called me and she said Brian
00:38:25
never showed up for work today do you
00:38:26
know where he is
00:38:28
and I told her what happened I said we
00:38:30
skied the backside of squa where we'd
00:38:32
hit Chik back I was going to pick them
00:38:34
up but they never showed up and I
00:38:35
haven't seen them since and I also
00:38:37
remember so clearly Brian's mom saying
00:38:40
oh my God and hanging up the phone and
00:38:42
that was so like so it's then we started
00:38:44
getting worried we called the police the
00:38:45
police didn't take it very seriously
00:38:46
because they thought ah they're out at a
00:38:48
party they ran off with a girl for the
00:38:49
night like they weren't worried but we
00:38:51
finally got search and rescue involved
00:38:53
and Rescuers of probe poles frowned
00:38:56
Brenan and Brian buried under 6 ft of
00:38:58
snow and they were they had been killed
00:39:00
from a massive Avalanche and so look I
00:39:03
think virtually everyone listening to
00:39:04
this I'm sure you to have lost somebody
00:39:06
close to you somebody that you love so I
00:39:08
know the experience was not unique in
00:39:10
that way but it was the first time that
00:39:12
I had experienced loss and it was the
00:39:15
first bad thing that had ever happened
00:39:16
to me in my life so it had a big impact
00:39:18
on me and there were a lot of takeaways
00:39:21
I think at the time I didn't have the
00:39:23
cognitive tools to piece together what
00:39:25
happened or to learn about what happened
00:39:28
like have any sort of takeaways but as I
00:39:30
got older and thought about it and
00:39:32
looking back I put together all these
00:39:35
like realizations of what that did to me
00:39:37
how it changed me and what were some of
00:39:39
the lessons from it too one that I talk
00:39:42
about in the book that I think about all
00:39:43
the time is my decision to not go with
00:39:47
them on a second run was this completely
00:39:50
brainless decision I put no thought into
00:39:52
that decision it was not a cost benefit
00:39:54
analysis I didn't think through it but
00:39:56
it's the most important decision I've
00:39:57
ever made in my life 100% chance if I
00:40:00
was with them I would have died and I
00:40:02
had skied literally thousands of runs
00:40:04
with Brendan and Brian how many times
00:40:06
did I deny a second run with them or say
00:40:09
you guys keep going I'm going to go in
00:40:11
almost never the one time I did it saved
00:40:13
my entire life and so that you really
00:40:16
realize that the world hangs by a thread
00:40:18
everybody thinks like oh you're going to
00:40:20
put a lot of thought into your big
00:40:21
decisions to make sure that you're
00:40:22
successful in life where you go to
00:40:23
college what your career is going to be
00:40:25
who you marry that's all great but the
00:40:27
world hangs by a thread and there are
00:40:29
tiny little no nothing decisions maybe
00:40:31
that you made today of maybe it was when
00:40:34
to cross the street maybe it was when to
00:40:36
leave to get in your car that can
00:40:38
utterly change the course of your life
00:40:41
and so when once you accept that of how
00:40:44
much the world hangs by a thread I think
00:40:45
you become much more humble with your
00:40:47
willingness to make forecasts about the
00:40:49
future what the economy is going to do
00:40:51
who's going to win the election what's
00:40:52
going to happen in my life my career my
00:40:54
family's life we have no clue we have no
00:40:57
idea because all we can think about are
00:40:59
the big decisions we cannot piece
00:41:02
together the chaos theory of I got in my
00:41:05
car at the at the wrong time I met the
00:41:08
wrong person or I met the right person
00:41:09
or you know I I decided not to take a
00:41:11
second run we cannot forecast the impact
00:41:13
of those things and so that had a big
00:41:16
impact on me too of just who are we to
00:41:18
fool ourselves that we can predict the
00:41:20
next recession that we can predict where
00:41:22
our careers are going to be in 10 years
00:41:24
that we can predict how long our
00:41:25
marriage is going to last that we can
00:41:27
predict how long we're going to live we
00:41:28
can't nobody can because we can't
00:41:30
predict how crazy these tiny events can
00:41:33
turn into and this comes right back to
00:41:35
investing doesn't it
00:41:37
because most people that consider
00:41:40
themselves to be investors whether
00:41:41
that's just putting a couple of quid
00:41:42
into crypto or something else engage in
00:41:46
the idea that they can predict the
00:41:47
future yeah um and this is where it
00:41:50
appears that most money is lost I mean
00:41:52
think about the biggest risk to the US
00:41:54
economy over the last two generations Co
00:41:57
mean that's one of them the others would
00:41:58
be Pearl Harbor okay 911 Co and maybe uh
00:42:02
Lan Brothers couldn't find a buyer in
00:42:04
2008 which sparked the financial crisis
00:42:06
of 2008 those are the biggest Risk by
00:42:08
far and the common denominator of every
00:42:10
one of those stories is that nobody saw
00:42:12
them coming they were not in any
00:42:14
newspaper before they happened they were
00:42:15
not in any economic Outlook nobody was
00:42:18
going on TV warning you that this was
00:42:20
coming the common denominator of those
00:42:22
is that they did all of their damage in
00:42:24
two seconds and that would be the case
00:42:26
going forward you can guarantee that the
00:42:28
biggest news story and the biggest risk
00:42:30
over the next year or the next 10 years
00:42:33
of our life whatever it is is something
00:42:34
that nobody's talking about today that
00:42:37
you and I have can't even fathom because
00:42:39
it's always been like that there's never
00:42:40
been a time when the biggest news story
00:42:42
was
00:42:43
foreseeable and it's all and it'll be
00:42:45
like that going forward so that's
00:42:46
another just like embracing how fragile
00:42:49
the world is there's a great quote from
00:42:50
a financial adviser who I really admire
00:42:52
Nam Carl Richards and he says risk is
00:42:54
what's left over when you think you've
00:42:56
thought of everything
00:42:57
H you can go out of your way to think
00:42:59
about all of the risks that are in your
00:43:00
life and like great and like how you're
00:43:02
going to prevent them great that's a
00:43:03
good thing to do when you're done with
00:43:05
that exercise what's left over that
00:43:07
you're not thinking about is what risk
00:43:09
actually is it's like by definition we
00:43:11
can never plan or even imagine what the
00:43:13
biggest risks in our lives are going to
00:43:14
be you say that in same as ever you say
00:43:17
I think the the chapter title is risk is
00:43:19
the things you can't see or something
00:43:21
risk is what you don't see risk is what
00:43:22
you don't see that was a little bit
00:43:24
terrifying and it's true and I think I
00:43:27
think sometime you can phrase it as
00:43:28
terrifying it's also kind of relieving
00:43:32
that like why are you going to put so
00:43:34
much effort into trying to predict what
00:43:36
the stock market's going to do next what
00:43:37
the econom is going to do next why are
00:43:39
you building a forecasting model to
00:43:41
figure out what the econom is going to
00:43:42
do over the next 10 years when you look
00:43:44
at the last 10 or 20 years how could you
00:43:46
ever predict 911 or Co and even look
00:43:50
like something like Co there's like a
00:43:51
2015 Bill Gates Ted Talk where he talks
00:43:54
about the biggest risk to society is a
00:43:56
viral pandemic so it's not that nobody
00:43:59
saw that thing coming but the specifics
00:44:02
of when it's going to happen how bad
00:44:04
it's going to be is it just going to
00:44:06
shut down the economy for a week or two
00:44:08
years that is completely impossible but
00:44:10
there's also lots of other TED Talks
00:44:11
that say everything's going to be great
00:44:13
of course of course there's proba
00:44:14
there's a lot more so on balance the
00:44:16
world had no idea I think on balance the
00:44:19
world breaks once per decade not exactly
00:44:22
once per de but on average once per
00:44:24
decade everything that you thought about
00:44:25
risk and uncertainty and stability goes
00:44:29
to [ __ ] so how do I prepare if risk if
00:44:32
risk is what I don't see how do I
00:44:33
prepare there's another great quote from
00:44:35
Nasim talad that I like where he says
00:44:37
invest in preparedness not in prediction
00:44:40
so rather than going out of your way to
00:44:41
be like here's what I think is going to
00:44:43
happen in crypto here's what I think is
00:44:44
going to happen in the stock market just
00:44:45
make sure that you have a big enough
00:44:47
buffer in your finances cash liquidity
00:44:50
being scared of debt so that no matter
00:44:52
what happens you're you at least have a
00:44:55
Fighting Chance of enduring it and make
00:44:57
through one thing I've I've often
00:44:59
thought about is that you should have
00:45:01
enough cash in your investing portfolio
00:45:03
the amount of cash you should have
00:45:05
should feel like it's too much it should
00:45:07
feel it should make you winse a little
00:45:08
bit because if you only have enough cash
00:45:11
to put up with the risk that you can
00:45:13
Envision and the risk that you can
00:45:14
foresee you're going to miss a surprise
00:45:16
every single time every single surprise
00:45:18
is going to be a surprise to you but if
00:45:20
you feel like you have too much cash
00:45:22
then at least you have a Fighting Chance
00:45:24
of putting up with the 911 the co the
00:45:27
Harbor whatever it might be so when
00:45:29
people look at my asset allocation my
00:45:32
investments a lot of people look at it
00:45:34
and say you seem really conservative why
00:45:36
do you have this much cash what are you
00:45:38
saving for and my answer is always I
00:45:40
don't know I have no idea what I'm
00:45:42
saving for who are we to assume that we
00:45:45
can predict the risks that are going to
00:45:47
be in our own personal lives and
00:45:49
throughout the broader World nobody can
00:45:51
do it the only way to prepare for it is
00:45:52
to have what feels like too much safety
00:45:55
what is your capital strategy how do you
00:45:57
invest your money um this is you know
00:46:00
this is the thing people want to know
00:46:01
most about you I keep it as painfully
00:46:04
simple as I possibly can so literally my
00:46:06
entire net worth is cash a house and
00:46:09
index funds and some shares of Marquel
00:46:11
where I'm on the board of directors and
00:46:13
that's it there's nothing else my entire
00:46:15
I can summarize everything so easily and
00:46:18
so cleanly and truly that's it and it's
00:46:20
not even like I have 20 bank accounts I
00:46:22
I have one bank account one brokerage
00:46:23
account like in a house and that's it so
00:46:25
simple why why index funds you're the
00:46:28
reason I your Capital allocation
00:46:31
strategy is almost identical to mine I
00:46:32
want to talk about the house thing as
00:46:33
well but um after reading your book I
00:46:36
stopped trying to pick stocks yeah and I
00:46:39
invested all of my available Capital
00:46:41
into index funds outside of investing it
00:46:45
in starting companies so I'm a
00:46:46
shareholder in I don't know 50 60 70
00:46:48
companies I all my other available
00:46:51
capital is invested in index funds and
00:46:53
then I have a very long-standing
00:46:57
position in ethereum which I've held for
00:46:58
like six years or something which has
00:47:00
done me very well yeah that is it and
00:47:02
the ethereum investment is also based on
00:47:05
the fact that I run a software business
00:47:07
that is in blockchain and I could see
00:47:09
that developers are building on top of
00:47:10
ethereum more than any other blockchain
00:47:12
so that Insight was really beneficial to
00:47:15
me and six years so even with the big
00:47:18
fall of the last two years you're still
00:47:20
up a lot yeah I I think your book taught
00:47:23
me that successful investing is when you
00:47:26
lose the pass to your investment account
00:47:28
yes that's exactly it I don't actually
00:47:30
think you said that in there but that's
00:47:31
like when I lose the password to my
00:47:33
investment account I'm so proud of
00:47:34
myself yeah because it means I haven't
00:47:36
checked it in
00:47:37
forever and so it was funny because you
00:47:39
were coming today I thought oh yeah well
00:47:41
I have all this money in these index
00:47:42
funds I'll check it and I thought [ __ ] I
00:47:44
don't know the password good that's why
00:47:46
you're going to do okay the reason I do
00:47:48
this what's important is that I am not
00:47:49
one of the people who says nobody can
00:47:51
beat the market so therefore use index
00:47:52
funds that's not what I believe I think
00:47:54
there I think it's extremely hard to
00:47:56
beat the market and very few people will
00:47:58
do it but I think there are really smart
00:48:00
people who can do it and people who I
00:48:02
know who I could invest with the reason
00:48:04
I don't is not because I don't believe
00:48:06
it can be done it's because the variable
00:48:07
that I want to maximize for in my
00:48:09
investments is endurance if I can just
00:48:12
earn average returns for an above
00:48:13
average period of time it's going to
00:48:15
lead to amount of success that will
00:48:17
literally put you in the top 5% of
00:48:19
investors my parents are a great example
00:48:22
of this my parents are smart people but
00:48:24
they really they have no Financial
00:48:25
background and they like minimal
00:48:27
financial interest I would say and but
00:48:29
they have dollar cost average into index
00:48:31
funds for going on 40 years now and
00:48:34
literally if you look at the returns
00:48:35
they've never sold anything ever and
00:48:37
literally if you look at the returns
00:48:38
they'd probably be in the top 3% of
00:48:40
professional investors what is for
00:48:42
anyone that doesn't know what is dollar
00:48:43
cost averaging and what is an index fund
00:48:45
dollar cost averaging means you buy the
00:48:48
same dollar amount of Investments every
00:48:50
single month come hell or high water
00:48:51
doesn't matter what the stock market's
00:48:52
doing recession boom bust you say I'm
00:48:55
going to put $100 or whatever it is in
00:48:57
the stock mark on the first of every
00:48:59
month now most people who like have a
00:49:00
401k at work are doing this whether they
00:49:03
know it or not they have $100 or
00:49:05
whatever removed from every paycheck and
00:49:07
it goes into the funds that they own and
00:49:09
they don't have to do anything whether
00:49:10
you know it or not you're actually doing
00:49:11
it the contrast to that would say I'm G
00:49:14
to buy and sell based off of how I feel
00:49:16
in the stock market I wake up I watch
00:49:18
CNBC I decided to sell and I'm going to
00:49:20
put it back in when I feel better about
00:49:21
the market it's the contrast to that an
00:49:23
index fund is just a single fund that
00:49:25
owns hundreds or or thousands of stocks
00:49:28
within it and if it's diverse enough if
00:49:30
it's big enough really what you're doing
00:49:31
is you're owning a slice of the global
00:49:33
economy which is how I think about it
00:49:35
it's thousands of individual stocks in
00:49:37
there Tesla Apple whatever it would be
00:49:39
but really what you're doing is you're
00:49:40
owning a slice of capitalism if I was
00:49:42
your son and I said Dad prove to me that
00:49:44
that's a better long-term wealth
00:49:46
creation strategy than buying crypto or
00:49:49
buying companies that I use or like how
00:49:51
would you explain that to your to your
00:49:54
kid your ability to do well over the
00:49:56
next one year or 5 years is going to
00:49:58
have no role whatsoever on your lifetime
00:50:00
ability to generate wealth all that's
00:50:02
going to matter is not what are the best
00:50:05
returns you can earn all that matters
00:50:07
are is what are the returns that you can
00:50:08
sustain for the longest period of time
00:50:10
all that matters is your endurance it
00:50:12
doesn't matter if you can double your
00:50:13
money this year or even double your
00:50:15
money again the next year all that
00:50:16
matters is can you stick and keep it
00:50:19
going for 50 years that's where
00:50:21
compounding comes from prove it all
00:50:23
because the formula for compounding is
00:50:25
returns to the power of time
00:50:27
that's not quite it but like more or
00:50:28
less that's it so in that equation if
00:50:30
you understand the math all of the heavy
00:50:32
lifting comes from the exponent prove it
00:50:34
because that's how exponential growth
00:50:36
works that's how it works it's literally
00:50:38
exponential give me a case study where
00:50:39
someone has followed that strategy and
00:50:41
done well okay here's one way to explain
00:50:42
it that I use in the book 99% of Warren
00:50:46
Buffett's net worth was accumulated
00:50:48
after his 60th
00:50:49
birthday after he turned 60 years old
00:50:52
99% of his wealth Jesus has been
00:50:54
accumulated after that period because
00:50:56
the longer do you hold that for the
00:50:58
crazier the numbers get when he was 60 I
00:51:00
think he was worth about $3 billion lot
00:51:02
of money he's a multi-billionaire but
00:51:04
now that he's 90 he's worth over hundred
00:51:06
billion and he's given like a 100
00:51:07
billion away to charity so if he didn't
00:51:09
do that he'd be worth he'd go from three
00:51:10
billion to 200 billion since he's been
00:51:12
60 because the numbers just get crazier
00:51:15
at that point he's worth a hundred
00:51:16
billion dollar so if his if his Market
00:51:18
if his net worth goes up 10% in one year
00:51:20
he makes $1 billion which is three times
00:51:22
that he was worth when he was 60 so
00:51:25
that's when you look at somebody like
00:51:26
Buffett is he a great investor is he a
00:51:28
great stock picker of course but the
00:51:30
real secret to his success is that he's
00:51:33
been a good investor for 80 years and if
00:51:36
he had retired at age 60 or at age 50
00:51:38
nobody would have ever heard of him he
00:51:40
would have been like one of the other
00:51:42
multi-billionaires who lives in Florida
00:51:44
and plays golf and like you've never
00:51:45
heard of him the reason he use a
00:51:47
household name is because he's been
00:51:49
doing this non-stop since he's since
00:51:51
he's been 11 years old and he's never
00:51:52
stopped it's just the endurance that's
00:51:54
made him so wealthy not necessarily the
00:51:56
annual returns patience it's a difficult
00:51:59
thing it also reminds me of the story
00:52:00
that you talk about in the introduction
00:52:01
of your book about the janitor Ronald
00:52:03
James Reed yeah who when he died in 2014
00:52:08
age 92 had a net worth of over 8
00:52:11
million and he was a janitor how did he
00:52:14
do that he took what very little money
00:52:16
he could save from his job as a janitor
00:52:18
mopping floors at the gas station he put
00:52:21
it in stocks and he left it alone for 70
00:52:23
years and that's it that's all you need
00:52:25
that's all you need to do if you have
00:52:27
endurance in your investing and you can
00:52:29
keep it going for years or decades you
00:52:31
don't need to be a genius stock picker
00:52:34
and not only you do not need to do it if
00:52:35
you have endurance you're going to beat
00:52:37
literally 97 or 99% of the genius stock
00:52:41
Pickers and what's so interesting about
00:52:43
it is like picking the right stocks is
00:52:45
hard it's supposed to be hard like
00:52:47
there's no world in which everybody who
00:52:48
tries to beat the market is going to do
00:52:50
it of course it's hard just like being
00:52:51
an NBA player is hard and but having
00:52:54
endurance is like largely in your
00:52:55
control
00:52:56
it's so much easier to just be patient
00:52:59
than it is to pick the right stocks
00:53:01
every single day now I think some people
00:53:03
nature nurture some people like probably
00:53:04
Ronald Reed and my parents Ju Just
00:53:07
understand it naturally it's not hard
00:53:08
for them to be patient but do like there
00:53:11
are professional investors who work 80
00:53:13
hours a week for 30 years to try to beat
00:53:16
the market and they can't do it not only
00:53:18
some that that explains like most of
00:53:20
them and even the ones who can do it are
00:53:21
maybe going to beat the market by half a
00:53:23
percent per year 1% per year but if you
00:53:25
can have Endor
00:53:27
that is that's a bigger benefit than you
00:53:29
can have by even being like a very
00:53:31
successful stock picker like somebody
00:53:32
who outperforms the market by one
00:53:34
percentage Point per year and they can
00:53:36
do that for 10 years that's amazing
00:53:39
that's like Mount Rushmore investor but
00:53:41
somebody who earns average returns and
00:53:43
does it for 20 years is going to have
00:53:45
way more money you do it for 30 years
00:53:47
you're going to be Filthy Rich you be
00:53:49
like Ronald Reed you can be a janitor
00:53:50
who leaves 8 million to charity when you
00:53:52
die but so in the case of Ronald Reed do
00:53:54
you not look at him a little bit and go
00:53:56
listen bro if you had eight or9 million
00:53:59
in the bank you should have been living
00:54:00
it up see this is one I I do kind of
00:54:03
regret that in the book that I'm I kind
00:54:05
of I didn't say it explicitly but I kind
00:54:07
of make him out to be a role model and I
00:54:09
don't think that's the case he he's not
00:54:10
my role model I think he's a fascinating
00:54:13
story of somebody who became Rich
00:54:15
despite not having any of the pedigree
00:54:18
or any of the skills that you are
00:54:20
normally associated with wealthy people
00:54:22
but you're right that he lived in a a a
00:54:26
s wed housing and he worked as a janitor
00:54:28
that's not my goal so I I I want to live
00:54:30
a nice life I want to be independent but
00:54:32
he's the most extreme example that you
00:54:34
can come up with and I I I wish I had
00:54:36
stated that more clearly in the book A
00:54:37
lot of people have this conversation
00:54:39
around pensions and in the UK we we can
00:54:41
pay money from our salary into our
00:54:43
pension but I think a lot of people
00:54:45
think gosh when I'm 60 when I'm 65 I
00:54:48
want to be rich I want to be rich when
00:54:49
I'm 25 yeah and I can go to Vegas and
00:54:53
you know ball out and buy nice things
00:54:56
and have great experiences not when I'm
00:54:58
65 yeah no I think that's true I think
00:55:00
there are a lot of people a lot of
00:55:01
financial advisers will say that one of
00:55:03
the hardest things they do as an adviser
00:55:05
is getting their clients to spend money
00:55:07
because they've been so conditioned to
00:55:08
save save save save save that when they
00:55:11
finally retire at 65 they don't know how
00:55:12
to spend they have no clue how to spend
00:55:14
money there's a great uh author I think
00:55:16
you've had him on your show RIT Siti who
00:55:18
talks about this a lot like how you like
00:55:19
you need to learn how to live a a rich
00:55:22
life and figure out what that is for you
00:55:24
for some people like for me it's just
00:55:25
like my my happy state is like sitting
00:55:28
on the couch in sweatpants reading a
00:55:30
book going for a walk with my wife
00:55:31
that's that's that's my rich life that I
00:55:33
love doing and to do that I need to be
00:55:35
independent and autonomous so I can do
00:55:37
that all day long I can do that on a
00:55:38
Wednesday afternoon rid talks a lot
00:55:40
about like maybe your rich life I think
00:55:42
for him it's flying first class and
00:55:44
wearing nice clothes and he talks about
00:55:46
like he drives I think like a beat up
00:55:48
Honda but he flies first class and he
00:55:50
dresses very nicely so you just have to
00:55:52
figure out what is the little thing
00:55:53
that's going to make you happy and I
00:55:55
think a lot of people's problem is that
00:55:57
Society tells you what you're supposed
00:56:00
to do to be happy you're supposed to
00:56:02
have a nice car you're supposed to have
00:56:03
a big house supposed to wear nice
00:56:04
clothes that's what Society tells you to
00:56:06
do and for some people that might be the
00:56:08
case for other people like me I think it
00:56:10
it's not that's that that would not ever
00:56:13
make me happy what does make me happy is
00:56:15
Independence so I can just do these
00:56:16
little quirky things that I like to do
00:56:18
so I think you just have to figure out
00:56:20
the little things that make you happy
00:56:22
rather than just being forced by Society
00:56:24
into what they want you to do
00:56:26
knowing when enough is enough this was
00:56:28
one of
00:56:29
the most interesting things that I think
00:56:31
really rang true to me was how do I know
00:56:34
in my life when enough is enough I've
00:56:35
definitely been a victim to that
00:56:36
external narrative that I need to have
00:56:38
these things in my life to be a happy
00:56:40
person but how does one go about knowing
00:56:43
when enough is enough I think back to
00:56:46
the story of my father he just woke up
00:56:47
one day and it was obvious that he would
00:56:50
he had been doing what he did for long
00:56:53
enough and it was he had felt like he
00:56:54
had enough and whatnot and he and he
00:56:56
broke away from it I
00:56:58
think for for a lot of people it's just
00:57:00
I one thing that's important about the
00:57:01
concept of having enough in Independence
00:57:03
is that when most people even if they
00:57:05
are independent they wake up every
00:57:07
morning what they want to do is go to
00:57:08
work one of one of the big problems with
00:57:10
the fire movement the financial
00:57:11
Independence retire early movement where
00:57:13
people are like they're going to be a
00:57:14
Super Saver and then retire at age 31
00:57:16
whatever it' be so many of those people
00:57:18
who actually did that and retired at age
00:57:21
31 they once they retired after about
00:57:23
two weeks they were bored out of their
00:57:24
mind and if they did it for six months
00:57:26
they were clinically depressed cuz for
00:57:28
most people you want to be productive
00:57:30
you want to keep doing it so having
00:57:33
enough doesn't necessarily mean that
00:57:34
you're going to stop working it just
00:57:36
means you're going to keep doing only
00:57:37
the work that you want to do there's a
00:57:39
really interesting question that Patrick
00:57:40
oesi asked a lot of people uh in in his
00:57:44
office he says if you won a billion
00:57:46
dollars in the lottery but you had to
00:57:48
stay at this job you're a billionaire
00:57:50
but you can't quit what did this company
00:57:52
would you want to do and what would you
00:57:54
get rid of and virtually everyone has an
00:57:56
answer for that question they say oh if
00:57:58
I didn't need the money but I have to
00:57:59
stay I would love to work on this
00:58:01
project I love working on this thing
00:58:03
this that and the other is all [ __ ]
00:58:05
to me so like in any job there's going
00:58:08
to be something that you want to do
00:58:09
there's going to be some project there's
00:58:10
going to be some position or or or maybe
00:58:12
it's like being an artist whatever it
00:58:13
would be it's not that you stop working
00:58:15
it's that when you have enough you get
00:58:16
to pick and choose which of those things
00:58:18
you're going to end up doing it's often
00:58:20
too late in our lives when we realize
00:58:21
the cost that we've paid for enough
00:58:24
never being enough you know it could
00:58:26
could be family it could be Health
00:58:27
whatever um I always reflect on the with
00:58:30
Brony we wasn't it who interviewed
00:58:31
people on their deathbeds and found out
00:58:33
that the biggest regret of the dying was
00:58:34
not living a life true to themselves
00:58:36
working too much Etc but that's on your
00:58:38
deathbed there's nothing you can do at
00:58:39
that point right and I think a lot about
00:58:41
this like what am I going to regret yes
00:58:43
I think about that too I think this is
00:58:45
this is pretty morbid to think about but
00:58:46
I think about if I were on my deathbed
00:58:48
tomorrow would I regret working hard and
00:58:51
saving a lot of money and my answer is
00:58:52
absolutely not it would give me so much
00:58:54
pleasure to know that my wife and my
00:58:56
young kids are going to be fine and the
00:58:58
opposite of that I cannot fathom being
00:59:00
on my deathbed and looking at my wife
00:59:02
and my 8-year-old son and my
00:59:03
four-year-old daughter and thinking you
00:59:05
guys are screwed that would that that
00:59:07
would that would be the biggest regret I
00:59:08
can fathom so I think a lot of people
00:59:10
would look at someone with a high
00:59:11
savings rate like me and would assume
00:59:13
that I'm going to regret it on my
00:59:15
deathbed and who knows but I I I have to
00:59:17
think it would actually be the opposite
00:59:19
what makes me gives me so much happiness
00:59:21
and pleasure is taking care of my family
00:59:23
and if I were to go tomorrow I wouldn't
00:59:25
regret for one second the car that I
00:59:27
didn't buy the big house I didn't buy
00:59:30
the nice clothes I didn't buy not for a
00:59:31
second would I regret not doing those
00:59:33
it's a really good frame to think there
00:59:34
isn't it about our financial decision-
00:59:36
making and you know a lot of people like
00:59:38
saving up to buy a lot of nonsense
00:59:40
that's going to depreciate and would you
00:59:42
rather have a little Nest Egg left over
00:59:44
for the ones you love or buy that
00:59:46
Lamborghini there's another great book
00:59:48
called die with zero which basically the
00:59:51
title is self-explanatory and one of the
00:59:54
concepts is even if you want to give
00:59:55
money away way to your family don't wait
00:59:57
until you die don't make your kids wait
00:59:59
or like hope you're going to die so they
01:00:00
can get their inheritance give it to
01:00:02
them when it really matters which for
01:00:03
most people is in their 30s and 40s if
01:00:05
you wait until you die at age 90 and
01:00:08
your kids are 60 and then they get your
01:00:10
money like what's the purpose of that
01:00:12
give it to them when they need it when
01:00:13
they're raising kids and whatnot that's
01:00:15
when they need your money I I I really
01:00:17
like that concept I think about that
01:00:19
with my own kids the counter point to
01:00:20
that is though if I just give my kids
01:00:22
money then like the chth quote
01:00:26
they might lose it quick think about
01:00:28
that especially as you know someone that
01:00:30
has a lot of cash they could give I
01:00:32
think about this because at some point
01:00:33
I'm G to have kids and they're going to
01:00:34
Daddy I want to do a driving lesson or
01:00:36
they're going to be 18 and go off to
01:00:38
University or whatever God I hope they
01:00:39
don't go to university um and they're
01:00:41
going to say like I've got nowhere to
01:00:43
live or I found this nice apartment dad
01:00:46
and in those moments do I make the
01:00:47
decision to pay for it because I can or
01:00:50
withhold it because they need to learn
01:00:51
the hard way I have this yeah I'd call
01:00:54
it an argument with my girlfriend
01:00:56
where I say babe listen when we have
01:00:57
kids they're going to sit an economy and
01:01:00
she's like absolutely not yeah and I'm
01:01:03
like no babe when they get okay we made
01:01:05
a deal I think we got to about when
01:01:06
they're 12 years old I'm going to put
01:01:07
them in economy so they can learn for
01:01:09
themselves the value of things see we we
01:01:13
made this mistake I don't think I've
01:01:14
ever talked about this but it was about
01:01:15
a year ago we flew my son who was me I
01:01:18
guess he was seven at the time we flew
01:01:19
first class and we explained to him that
01:01:22
this was not normal this was not going
01:01:24
to be the way it is as soon as as he did
01:01:26
it he went home he told all of our
01:01:27
neighbors told all of his friends told
01:01:29
everybody at school and that was when my
01:01:32
I like can't can't do this never again
01:01:35
you see how quickly somebody can be
01:01:36
spoiled or use that to try to show other
01:01:39
people that they are superior to them
01:01:41
that's when it was like no no we can't
01:01:42
ever do this ever again and you moved
01:01:44
his expectations in a way absolutely I
01:01:46
didn't fly first class till I was 35 and
01:01:48
he did it at 7 and so that my when I
01:01:50
first did it at 35 I remember feeling a
01:01:53
I earned this I worked for this and Al
01:01:56
felt so special to me because I'd flown
01:01:57
coach 9,000 times before that so it felt
01:02:00
amazing and so that's I I I think about
01:02:02
that a lot there's a great quote from
01:02:03
Charlie Munger where one of his rich
01:02:05
friends says Charlie if I give my kids
01:02:08
all of my money is that going to ruin
01:02:10
their ambition and Charlie says of
01:02:12
course it will but you have to do it
01:02:14
anyways and the guy says why and Charlie
01:02:16
says because if you don't your kids will
01:02:17
hate you and I think that's that too is
01:02:20
like lots of Charlie Monger quotes are
01:02:22
are framed as black and white they're
01:02:24
extreme but I think that's probably like
01:02:25
80% true really that it's it's maybe 70%
01:02:29
true that if you are a wealthy person
01:02:31
and I'm not talking billionaires if you
01:02:32
just have a moderate amount of wealth
01:02:34
that you might pass along to your kids
01:02:35
someday that your two options are kind
01:02:37
of at least to some extent hurt their
01:02:39
ambition or risk some level of strife
01:02:42
and it's always child dependent like I
01:02:44
always make the example that if
01:02:46
18-year-old Bill Gates or Mark
01:02:47
Zuckerberg or Elon Musk inherited a
01:02:49
billion dollars would have made any
01:02:51
difference to their ambition they would
01:02:52
have they would not have slowed them
01:02:54
down by one second but most people
01:02:56
including myself it would have like I
01:02:59
was driven by fear of not making it
01:03:01
which is what most people are I was I
01:03:03
was scared shitless that I was not going
01:03:05
to find the right career that I wasn't
01:03:07
going to make it and that's what drove
01:03:08
me some people don't need that but I
01:03:12
think it's very rare I think the huge
01:03:14
majority of people if you give them an
01:03:16
easy life they will take it and embrace
01:03:18
it with both hands making money and
01:03:20
keeping money require two different
01:03:22
skills you you've spoken about a few of
01:03:24
the skills that are required for making
01:03:26
money the one that really stuck out to
01:03:28
me that you've discussed so far is this
01:03:29
idea of endurance patience regardless of
01:03:32
what's happening in the markets
01:03:33
regardless of the volatility lose your
01:03:35
password and sit on your hands just on
01:03:38
that point as well I remember reading
01:03:39
somewhere it might have even been your
01:03:40
book you know it's so crazy because the
01:03:43
things that I know about money I can't
01:03:44
remember where I've got them from but
01:03:46
most of them came from this book like
01:03:48
most of the principles came from this
01:03:49
book and one of the things that I read
01:03:51
was that Warren Buffett would go like
01:03:53
five years without allocating capital
01:03:55
and this where he said the hardest thing
01:03:58
to be a great investor is to be able to
01:04:00
sit on your hands and do nothing sit on
01:04:01
your ass and do nothing that's it that's
01:04:03
that's AER quote and that's what they're
01:04:05
doing right now right now Berkshire
01:04:06
hathway which is Warren Buffett's
01:04:07
company has like $150 billion dollar of
01:04:09
cash right now and that's their entire
01:04:12
uh 60-year history of Warren Buffett and
01:04:14
Brookshire hathway is build up a
01:04:16
shitload of cash wait 10 years for an
01:04:18
opportunity deploy it all and then go
01:04:21
back to waiting and building up cash
01:04:23
crazy and that's that's that's how they
01:04:24
done it good opportunities are rare of
01:04:26
course they are they should be rare it
01:04:27
shouldn't be that anybody can just open
01:04:29
up their stock account and find the
01:04:30
opportunity of a lifetime what are the
01:04:32
gonna come once a decade what are the
01:04:33
other skills then endurance patience to
01:04:35
create to get money for the for the
01:04:38
ordinary person endurance and patience
01:04:40
is 99% of what you need as an investor
01:04:42
because the opportunities there to
01:04:44
invest in a lowcost Index Fund are
01:04:46
available for everybody and you can do
01:04:47
that from your phone like you do it from
01:04:48
your phone open up a Robinhood account
01:04:50
buy some index funds anybody can do that
01:04:52
and so that and but that was not always
01:04:54
the case it used to be 20 years ago that
01:04:57
the only people who could invest were
01:04:58
people who had a lot of money and could
01:05:00
afford a broker and had connection to a
01:05:01
broker and you yet to like make a phone
01:05:02
call make a phone call you had to know a
01:05:04
guy and even then you were going to pay
01:05:05
a ridiculous fee to that person for do
01:05:08
pieces of paper and all kinds it was a
01:05:09
joke and that's 20 years ago it's not
01:05:11
that long ago so I think like people
01:05:13
aren't grateful enough or appreciative
01:05:16
enough of how much things have changed
01:05:18
that open up those opportunities for
01:05:19
everybody you talk about the skill of
01:05:21
keeping money which is different from
01:05:22
the skill of getting money is predicated
01:05:26
on Survival Financial survival and just
01:05:28
putting up with all the unpredictable
01:05:31
nonsense that's going to happen between
01:05:33
now and the end of your life and we
01:05:35
talked earlier about the surprises Pearl
01:05:37
Harbor 9911 all these big surprises just
01:05:40
it's just your ability to endure things
01:05:42
like that that's going to be literally
01:05:44
90% of your financial success and your
01:05:46
investing success so gaining money is
01:05:48
like being an optimist and taking a risk
01:05:50
like being optimistic about yourself
01:05:52
swinging for the fences you need that to
01:05:54
get rich staying rich is is like the
01:05:56
exact opposite you need a level of being
01:05:58
conservative you need to be scared you
01:06:01
need to be like acknowledge of all the
01:06:03
unknown risks that are in front of us
01:06:05
and have a financial allocation and a
01:06:07
mindset that's going to allow you to
01:06:09
endure them and survive them financially
01:06:11
you need both of those skills at the
01:06:12
same time so well your kid is 20 years
01:06:15
old he's broke do you tell him to go and
01:06:19
take huge outsized risks he's not got a
01:06:21
family he's not got a mortgage he's not
01:06:22
got a dog what advice do you give him at
01:06:25
that age to create wealth I would
01:06:27
actually say I think this is a little
01:06:28
counterintuitive that when somebody is
01:06:29
Young you you think you would say you
01:06:31
got 50 years in front of you swing for
01:06:33
the fences go for it it's also when your
01:06:35
life is the most fragile it's when
01:06:37
you're most likely to be laid off most
01:06:39
likely to change your career most likely
01:06:40
to break up or get divorced whatever it
01:06:42
would be and so for that you need quite
01:06:45
a bit of financial flexibility just cash
01:06:47
and liquidity so once you had some level
01:06:49
built up whatever the level might be for
01:06:51
a different person then like do
01:06:53
something crazy I also think for careers
01:06:56
some of the best career advice that's
01:06:58
maybe not Universal but when you
01:07:00
graduate college and you're looking at
01:07:02
your career don't take the safe job
01:07:04
which is usually like the big company
01:07:06
the blue chick company go for the weird
01:07:08
company why go for something crazy
01:07:10
because when you're older when you're 40
01:07:12
and you have two kids and a mortgage
01:07:14
you're not going to want to take the
01:07:15
weird job that's when you want the
01:07:17
stability that's when you're probably
01:07:18
going to want the job that's has good
01:07:20
benefits and a stable paycheck cuz you
01:07:22
need that when you're 22 and you're not
01:07:24
tied down by anything
01:07:26
don't go work for Goldman Sachs or apple
01:07:28
or deoe or something like that go for
01:07:29
the weird startup where you like you're
01:07:31
you're going to learn something
01:07:32
completely different linked to that
01:07:35
point is in the weird startup you're
01:07:37
going to be so close to the failure and
01:07:38
failure is the knowledge you're going to
01:07:40
learn so much much and there's so many
01:07:42
people who take the blue chip the safe
01:07:44
job out of college and it puts them on a
01:07:46
very predictable track you're going to
01:07:48
be an analyst for two years and then if
01:07:49
you're good you'll get promoted to
01:07:51
senior analyst and then you'll get
01:07:53
promoted to associate it's like very
01:07:54
stable and linear and that's the like
01:07:57
it's you're capping all of your upside
01:07:59
where if you go for the weird company
01:08:00
you're either going to do one of two
01:08:01
things it's either going to fail and
01:08:03
you're going to learn a lot from that or
01:08:05
it's going to take off and you're going
01:08:06
to learn a lot from that and then maybe
01:08:07
when you're 40 after going through all
01:08:09
that then you want the stable job at the
01:08:11
big company it's interesting I was
01:08:13
thinking as you're speaking that the
01:08:14
proximity from your desk and the
01:08:17
CEOs probably needs to widen over time
01:08:20
yes I think I think that's that's true
01:08:22
yeah absolutely and mo most people I
01:08:24
think if they if you do it the other way
01:08:26
around or most people would never do it
01:08:27
the other around if you start your
01:08:29
career in the stable company you're
01:08:31
probably never going to leave you're
01:08:32
going to get addicted to the nice
01:08:34
paycheck the stable benefits whatnot and
01:08:36
you're never going to take a risk and do
01:08:37
anything else maybe that's okay maybe
01:08:39
for some people's personalities that's
01:08:40
exactly what they want but I think there
01:08:42
is a higher level of regret for people
01:08:44
that start in a safe company and then
01:08:46
they get the golden handcuffs they can't
01:08:47
leave and by the time they're 40 and
01:08:50
they realize that they wanted to work at
01:08:51
the crazy company they can't because
01:08:52
they got a mortgage and two kids and
01:08:54
they're saving for retirement and they
01:08:55
can't take the risk at that level of
01:08:57
their life you introduced this concept
01:08:59
of
01:09:00
tales long tales and this also changed
01:09:04
my life changed my investment strategy I
01:09:05
should probably say you talk about the
01:09:07
example of venture capital where for
01:09:09
every 50 Investments That Venture
01:09:11
capitalists make statistically half of
01:09:14
them will completely fail 10 will do
01:09:16
okay and one or two will make huge
01:09:19
profits that drive 100% of the funds
01:09:21
returns yeah this is a lesson about
01:09:23
investing in finance but it's also me a
01:09:25
lesson about life it's always life yeah
01:09:27
it applies to everything Tales where
01:09:30
just a couple of things that happen
01:09:32
explain 90 or 99% of what matters it's
01:09:36
always the case you see it in business
01:09:38
where you take in the United States
01:09:40
there are you know thousands of public
01:09:42
companies that you can buy stock in but
01:09:44
the huge majority of the value in the US
01:09:47
Stock Market is in like 10 companies
01:09:48
Apple Tesa Microsoft so even though you
01:09:51
have thousands of companies 10 of them
01:09:52
are the ones that really matter and are
01:09:54
going to drive all of the r turns over
01:09:55
time so why you just buy those 10
01:09:57
because nobody knows what they're going
01:09:58
to be at least in hindsight that that
01:10:00
that's the argument for owning a
01:10:01
thousand of them is that you know that
01:10:03
the 10 that are going to be the next big
01:10:04
ones are going to be in there all of
01:10:06
this is a case for humility this is
01:10:08
honestly what I took away from your book
01:10:10
you're expecting to walk away with tips
01:10:14
all these tips these tricks these
01:10:15
special ways to make more money than
01:10:17
everybody what I came away with is this
01:10:20
one important lesson that I've never
01:10:23
been able to unsee which is I don't know
01:10:26
I I think that's great and that back to
01:10:28
I wrote this book for myself that's been
01:10:30
the biggest lesson for me is not only do
01:10:33
I know but nobody else knows either
01:10:35
everyone everyone else is bullshitting
01:10:36
their way through the investing Market
01:10:37
too they don't know either I'm in this
01:10:39
crypto chat where one of my friends I
01:10:41
won't disparage him one of my friends
01:10:43
he's the guy in the chat that's always
01:10:44
posting the forecast graphs you know
01:10:46
those ones where they kind of like the
01:10:47
little logger graphs where they forecast
01:10:49
where the stock or the crypto where they
01:10:50
think it's going to go right and it's
01:10:52
always it's always up and to the right
01:10:56
um and it's kind of like male horoscopes
01:10:58
I heard someone say that that that's
01:11:00
such a great yeah no I think that's I
01:11:02
think what's closest to investing is
01:11:03
something like the horoscope or even if
01:11:05
you know it's [ __ ] you want to read
01:11:06
it why because it's comforting what a
01:11:09
lot of people want out of their
01:11:10
investing forecasts or whatever it is is
01:11:12
they want to reduce the uncertainty
01:11:14
that's giving them stress because
01:11:16
everyone I think intuitively knows that
01:11:17
the future in front of us is unknown and
01:11:19
it's unknowable but that hurts and so if
01:11:22
it hurts you try to reduce that stress
01:11:24
by finding someone who says I do know
01:11:26
what's going to happen you know what
01:11:27
this applies as well is I read Amazon's
01:11:29
Jeff Bezos who's the CEO and founder of
01:11:30
Amazon his shareholder letter where he
01:11:33
says we have to be the best place in the
01:11:35
world to fail um we swing for the fences
01:11:38
10 times and for every 10 swings nine of
01:11:41
them are in the Amazon graveyard he's
01:11:43
talking there about a9.com which nobody
01:11:45
knows cuz failed the fir phone which
01:11:47
nobody knows but the one in 10 pay for
01:11:50
the entirety of the graveyard the one in
01:11:51
one 10 is going to be AWS which make 70
01:11:54
billion this year right he talked about
01:11:55
that when the fir phone from Amazon
01:11:57
which if you don't know Amazon built a
01:11:59
cell phone it's called the fir phone and
01:12:00
it was a joke it was a disaster it was a
01:12:02
massive flop and he was doing like an
01:12:04
analyst call and this analyst talked
01:12:07
about like hey the Fire Phone flopped
01:12:09
like what happened there and bezo said
01:12:10
if you think that was a big failure just
01:12:12
wait you've seen nothing yet and like
01:12:14
that's why Amazon's successful they're
01:12:16
willing to try a thousand things with
01:12:18
the idea that they know 990 of them are
01:12:21
going to fail but the 10 that work are
01:12:23
going to be massive and you can fail
01:12:25
well and have the mentality to fail and
01:12:28
the financial backing to be able to fail
01:12:30
like make sure your bets are not that
01:12:32
big and you can just keep taking little
01:12:33
risks all the time the optionality that
01:12:36
you get from that like the odds that one
01:12:38
or two of those are going to explode are
01:12:40
huge it's massive I mean it's no
01:12:42
different than how do you win the
01:12:44
lottery you have to buy thousands and
01:12:46
thousands or millions of tickets if you
01:12:48
buy billions of tickets you'll probably
01:12:49
win the lottery it's probably not going
01:12:50
to pay off because it doesn't work like
01:12:52
that but it's the same concept like if
01:12:54
you if you if you take enough swings at
01:12:56
bat one of them is going to hit
01:12:58
eventually and this is also
01:13:01
a reason why some companies look
01:13:04
Innovative they look like their Geniuses
01:13:05
but in fact their failure rate is
01:13:08
massive massive there's a story at at at
01:13:10
Netflix several years ago where there
01:13:12
was uh a report to the CEO and the and
01:13:15
the report was all of the new movies
01:13:18
that we've come out that that we've that
01:13:19
we've produced have been successful and
01:13:22
whoever presented that probably thought
01:13:23
this is great this is what you want hear
01:13:25
and the CEO said that's terrible that
01:13:27
means we're not taking enough risks if
01:13:29
every movie that we release is a hit
01:13:32
we're not taking risks like you want
01:13:34
your failure rate to be at least some
01:13:36
that that's when you know you're at
01:13:37
least trying something new it's the same
01:13:39
like if you're managing uh a hotel you
01:13:42
don't want every room to be sold out
01:13:44
because that means you're not pricing
01:13:45
high enough you know you're doing a good
01:13:46
job when you have 10 empty rooms that's
01:13:49
when you know you're pricing the other
01:13:50
rooms at a high enough rate so there's
01:13:53
always going to be like some level of
01:13:55
what looks like failure that you need
01:13:57
and if you don't have it you're not
01:13:58
taking a big enough risk Daniel X sat
01:14:00
here and he said the same thing he goes
01:14:02
one of the most important metrics that I
01:14:03
think about at Spotify is our mistake
01:14:06
rate yeah and people will think okay so
01:14:08
he wants to limit mistakes very much the
01:14:10
opposite he wants to make sure that the
01:14:12
company maintains that sort of startup
01:14:15
mentality and they increase their rate
01:14:17
of mistakes and this brings me to
01:14:19
something which I kind of hit me like a
01:14:21
truck um in your new book same as ever
01:14:23
which was this idea that we need to keep
01:14:25
running now there were areas in my
01:14:27
professional life where I've been
01:14:28
successful poas is doing well I think
01:14:31
doing pretty well and I had a I had a
01:14:33
car Journey with Jima who's through the
01:14:35
wall who you met and we last time we
01:14:37
came to well I'm in the front seat of
01:14:38
the car and I go Jima do you know what
01:14:39
our biggest um our biggest threat is now
01:14:43
complacency when people get successful
01:14:46
they play defense to their detriment um
01:14:50
they don't play offense as much as they
01:14:52
need to to keep up with the rate of
01:14:54
change in the world and then a young
01:14:57
Scrappy agile incumbent who has a high
01:15:00
risk appetite will take their cheese
01:15:03
right and your chapter on keep running
01:15:05
there's two quotes that I really pulled
01:15:06
out chapter is called keep running and
01:15:09
the quot two quotes that I pulled out
01:15:11
were competitive advantages tend to be
01:15:14
shortlived often because their success
01:15:17
plants the seeds of their own decline
01:15:21
one more quote it's easy to overlook how
01:15:24
many forces pull you away from your
01:15:26
competitive Advantage once you have one
01:15:29
specifically because you have one
01:15:31
success has its own gravity that's right
01:15:34
and the the the the biggest source of
01:15:36
gravity there is laziness the reason
01:15:38
you're successful is because you work so
01:15:40
hard to get to where you were and now
01:15:42
that you feel like you've made it now
01:15:43
that you feel like you're on the top of
01:15:44
the mountain top you get lazy and that's
01:15:46
so many companies fall for that so many
01:15:47
careers fall for that there's a great
01:15:49
story from Jerry Seinfeld where he said
01:15:51
that one of the reasons that he quit the
01:15:53
show when it was still going gang
01:15:55
Busters is because he could start to
01:15:56
sense that what made the show successful
01:15:59
was starting to be was starting to go
01:16:01
away he said and part of the reason is
01:16:03
was because he got so famous when he was
01:16:06
not that famous he could go sit in a
01:16:08
coffee shop and watch how people ordered
01:16:10
their coffee and make a joke out of it
01:16:12
he was observing how Society worked once
01:16:14
he got very famous he couldn't do that
01:16:16
anymore he was too famous to go sit in a
01:16:17
deli and watch how people order their
01:16:19
sandwiches he couldn't do it so
01:16:20
therefore he didn't have a lot of the
01:16:22
source material that he had before and
01:16:24
so he was like look what made me so
01:16:26
funny and the show so successful I can't
01:16:28
do anymore so like red alert let's pull
01:16:31
the plug before it gets really bad here
01:16:33
so that's like a very specific example
01:16:35
but what he realized that what made him
01:16:37
successful was gone and a lot of a lot
01:16:39
of CEOs will will have this problem too
01:16:42
where what made them successful was that
01:16:44
they were a scrappy startup founder and
01:16:46
they were very good at building a
01:16:47
product but now that the company is big
01:16:49
and successful they also need to be an
01:16:50
HR Manager they need to be a finance
01:16:52
specialist they need to be a marketer
01:16:54
they need to be all these other things
01:16:56
and therefore their time is pulled away
01:16:58
from what they're actually good at which
01:16:59
was building a product a good example of
01:17:01
this if I can say it was Travis kenck of
01:17:04
uber the founder of uber probably nobody
01:17:07
in the world was better at scaling a
01:17:09
company like uber than he than he was
01:17:11
and there were a few people who were
01:17:13
worse at managing a big company than he
01:17:16
was so it's like what made Uber
01:17:18
successful is what pulled him away from
01:17:21
being a successful manager at that he
01:17:22
was very good at one thing he was the
01:17:24
best in the world at that one thing but
01:17:27
you shouldn't think that like it's going
01:17:28
to last during when another phase of the
01:17:30
company's life my person I consider a
01:17:33
mentor and a friend of mine been a
01:17:35
long-term friend of mine a guy called
01:17:36
Shaquille Khan he was one of the very
01:17:37
first investors in shop in Spotify um
01:17:39
new Daniel the founder from the very
01:17:41
Beginnings he said to me um a piece of
01:17:44
advice that stayed with me and I've also
01:17:47
imparted on other people at a time when
01:17:49
I'd left my company I was now
01:17:51
financially successful um financially
01:17:53
free by all regards and and I called him
01:17:55
after leaving my company and I said D I
01:17:57
said Shaq what should I do now with my
01:18:00
life he said to me Stephen the reason
01:18:02
you were successful was because you were
01:18:04
hungry you need to realize that you're
01:18:06
no longer hungry for the same reasons
01:18:09
and what he told me to do was the
01:18:10
hardest [ __ ] thing I've ever done in
01:18:11
my life which was nothing he said spend
01:18:14
a year don't rush back into starting the
01:18:16
same business again because he said to
01:18:17
me the reason why you were so
01:18:20
unbelievably disciplined and would go to
01:18:21
the office seven days a week was because
01:18:23
you were like an insecure kid that was
01:18:24
like fighting to survive that's gone now
01:18:26
so sit on your hands for a year do
01:18:28
absolutely nothing and get inspired
01:18:30
again get get hungry again about
01:18:31
something new um because my Temptation
01:18:33
was just to run back in and start a big
01:18:35
marketing business again or whatever
01:18:36
yeah I that's kind of what you're you're
01:18:38
speaking of as well is that like the
01:18:40
need to understand that our motivations
01:18:41
evolve and change over time and the
01:18:43
thing that made us successful might not
01:18:44
be the thing that makes us successful
01:18:46
again in a new Venture I think there are
01:18:47
some people who really can keep it going
01:18:49
some people who do keep running like
01:18:50
Elon [ __ ] perfect example guy worth a
01:18:52
quarter of a trillion dollars still
01:18:54
works 100 hours a week so there are
01:18:55
those people who exist but I think for a
01:18:57
lot of people this should not be a scary
01:18:59
thing the fact that after you've made it
01:19:01
and have some success and some some
01:19:02
wealth that you're not as hungry as you
01:19:04
used to be that's fine just you just
01:19:06
have to accept it it gets dangerous when
01:19:09
people don't realize it and they they
01:19:11
are less hungry they're not as motivated
01:19:13
but they're still going to try to go
01:19:15
start a new business even though they
01:19:16
don't need it anymore and then they're
01:19:17
shocked when that business doesn't work
01:19:19
he said to me you need to take on a
01:19:22
moonshot and cuz he know he goes you you
01:19:24
did the first business you did well
01:19:26
whatever Etc he goes the thing that will
01:19:27
make you hungry and sufficiently
01:19:29
terrified is you now need to find a big
01:19:32
scary terrifying goal that's what Elon
01:19:34
did with Twitter yeah he'd already
01:19:36
become the richest man in the world and
01:19:37
he probably got bored a little bit and
01:19:38
he said I need to do something that's
01:19:40
crazy and that even for someone like me
01:19:42
is going to be an absolute stretch to
01:19:43
pull off crazy which is buying Twitter
01:19:45
and running into the ground I mean
01:19:46
there's no surprise that billionaires
01:19:48
will seem to start rocket companies yeah
01:19:50
I mean the reason that they are
01:19:52
successful is because they have that
01:19:53
complete swing for def fenses I mean
01:19:55
most people would quit full stop when
01:19:57
their net worth hit 10 million or less 3
01:20:00
million and so for someone to have a net
01:20:02
worth of 10 billion and to wake up and
01:20:04
say I'm going to keep going as hard as I
01:20:06
possibly can that's why they have that
01:20:08
level of success it's complete
01:20:09
insatiable Hunger for More I sat with a
01:20:12
billionaire when I was
01:20:13
20 going to say 24 years old and I sat
01:20:16
in his office and I thought okay this
01:20:17
could be really interesting I get to
01:20:18
meet this very successful person in
01:20:20
Manchester and I looked into his eyes
01:20:22
and said why are you doing this like you
01:20:24
have all this money and it became
01:20:26
completely apparent to me that it was
01:20:27
not about the money it was all about
01:20:29
competition I then went and met another
01:20:31
billionaire who was in Manchester runs
01:20:32
another big company Manchester everybody
01:20:33
knows the company and it was the same
01:20:35
thing with him it was the thing that had
01:20:37
got him to a billion was the thing that
01:20:40
was going to keep him going after a
01:20:41
billion yeah I mean there's there's a
01:20:44
chapter in my book about natural Maniacs
01:20:46
like people like wild Minds people the
01:20:47
kind of person like Elon Musk who has
01:20:49
that mindset to say you know when he was
01:20:52
30 years old or whatever he took on GM
01:20:55
Ford Chrysler and NASA when he was like
01:20:57
30 the kind of person who thinks that is
01:21:00
not the kind of person who's going to
01:21:01
say I have enough I'm going to put it
01:21:03
all in Muni bonds and go live on the
01:21:04
farm like it's not the person who thinks
01:21:07
they can do that and can pull that off
01:21:09
is the kind of person who's never going
01:21:10
to stop if Elon Must List till he's 97
01:21:12
he's going to be starting new rocket
01:21:13
companies for sure do you think he's
01:21:15
happy no absolutely none I think most
01:21:17
people in that situation the word that I
01:21:19
would use is tortured I think they wake
01:21:21
up every morning tortured at the
01:21:23
problems that they are aspiring to solve
01:21:25
that they haven't solved yet there's
01:21:27
almost no biography of a very successful
01:21:30
person like that of that level of
01:21:32
success that you would read their
01:21:33
biography and say that life sounds great
01:21:35
it's one of the things that hit me like
01:21:36
a train truck was those two billionaires
01:21:38
I met were just the most miserable
01:21:40
people absolutely and I met their their
01:21:42
one of their sons and they go dad is so
01:21:44
unhappy I remember him saying that to me
01:21:46
and just go [ __ ] he's going to that
01:21:48
office every single day has a billion
01:21:49
dollars and his kids think he's like sad
01:21:52
there's this amazing story do you
01:21:54
remember uh
01:21:55
Myspace back in the day before before
01:21:57
Facebook and the guy who ran it his name
01:21:58
was Tom I forget his last name but when
01:22:00
you signed up for Myspace Tom was your
01:22:02
first follow he was the founder of
01:22:04
Myspace and every he followed everybody
01:22:07
and he sold Myspace I think to Qualicom
01:22:10
maybe no I'm sorry he sold he sold
01:22:13
Myspace to Viacom and uh did pretty well
01:22:16
let's say I'm guessing let's say he made
01:22:18
$50 million it's probably something in
01:22:20
in in in that range it's it's probably
01:22:21
nothing that's dramatic 500 was it he
01:22:24
sold the company for that much actually
01:22:26
don't but it was it was it was it was a
01:22:28
good but not extraordinary sum of money
01:22:30
and you can see his life on Instagram
01:22:32
it's not exaggeration he's like travels
01:22:34
around the world with his girlfriend
01:22:36
hiking in Bali it looks like at least
01:22:38
from Instagram he lives this amazing
01:22:39
life and then think about Mark
01:22:41
Zuckerberg who is like every year hauled
01:22:43
before Congress where he's like screamed
01:22:46
at for causing all of society's ills and
01:22:48
he has so much on his shoulders and
01:22:50
Facebook stock fell 70% last year
01:22:53
because everyone thinks it's going to
01:22:54
and like it looks like a very stressful
01:22:56
incredible amount of pressure on his
01:22:58
shoulders if you were to ask me which
01:23:01
one of those lives would I take would I
01:23:02
rather be someone with $50 million who
01:23:04
was traveling around the world hiking in
01:23:07
Bali with my wife or would I be wor a
01:23:09
hundred billion do and wake up every
01:23:11
morning scared shitless with so much
01:23:13
pressure on my shoulders for me it's
01:23:15
obvious I'd much rather be Tom than Mark
01:23:17
but that pressure is a drug in the sense
01:23:21
that when I say the pressure is a drug I
01:23:22
mean we know from motivation psychology
01:23:25
and I mean I think I saw on the back of
01:23:27
your your book yeah Daniel H pink y
01:23:30
Daniel pink told me that when people
01:23:32
aren't sufficiently challenged they lose
01:23:33
motivation and their level of challenge
01:23:35
kind of increases so to be engaged with
01:23:37
a task you need to um and you think of
01:23:40
this like game psychology the levels
01:23:42
need to get harder and harder for you to
01:23:43
be engaged that's why every game we play
01:23:45
it's not on level one over and over and
01:23:47
over again we need it to go to level two
01:23:48
crosswords get more difficult we stay
01:23:50
engaged do you not think that's the case
01:23:52
with like a big famous CEO know that
01:23:54
their engagement appetite their
01:23:56
challenge appetite just grows and that's
01:23:59
the only way they can stay engaged solve
01:24:01
bigger problems I think if you look at
01:24:02
someone like Bill Gates I think he had
01:24:04
figured out business and in 2000 he he
01:24:09
effectively quit Microsoft but he
01:24:10
immediately moved on to what I think was
01:24:12
in his mind a bigger problem which was
01:24:14
like how do I give this money away
01:24:15
effectively and how do I eradicate
01:24:17
malaria those kind of problems and so
01:24:19
even for someone like him who was able
01:24:20
to extract himself from the business
01:24:22
they' immediately move on to something
01:24:24
that I think in his mind was more
01:24:26
problematic and a bigger challenge so
01:24:28
there's never going to be a period where
01:24:29
someone like that were to say I've had
01:24:30
enough I'm just going to retire to read
01:24:32
books like that will never be the case
01:24:34
it's always going to be I think they're
01:24:35
addicted to the challenge is what it is
01:24:38
yeah and I think I I think I am I think
01:24:40
I think everybody is to some extent and
01:24:42
the mus and the gates those people are
01:24:44
extreme examples of it but every I think
01:24:46
everybody needs a minimum level of
01:24:49
stress in their life and the irony is
01:24:51
that we all kind of dream about like
01:24:53
what can I do to at the stress so I just
01:24:55
wake up in Nirvana every day and you
01:24:57
can't everyone needs to have some sort
01:25:00
of conflict Strife challenge stress in
01:25:03
their life and for I think for a lot of
01:25:04
people if they don't get it from real
01:25:06
places they just make up fake problems
01:25:08
in their life that's that's a big
01:25:09
problem with people for people who
01:25:11
richer people who have a lot of things
01:25:12
they will start worrying and stressing
01:25:14
about the most minute things because
01:25:16
they need that stress in their life on
01:25:19
that point as well just popping back to
01:25:20
we were talking about the complacency
01:25:22
the other thing that I think successful
01:25:24
people become a victim of is their own
01:25:27
correctness I think about that with me
01:25:29
like I've been right about several
01:25:30
decisions in a row so surely that
01:25:32
creates evidence that I'm probably right
01:25:34
again and that can be your downfall as
01:25:36
well or what a lot of it is is you were
01:25:38
right on this topic and then therefore
01:25:40
you assume that you're going to be right
01:25:41
on another topic and you didn't know the
01:25:42
role luck might have played you didn't
01:25:44
know what luck would play but let's say
01:25:45
you're a very successful investor and
01:25:48
then and they'll say you're like
01:25:49
massively successful a lot of those
01:25:50
people will think therefore I can also
01:25:53
be an effective politician
01:25:54
therefore I can also be an expert on Co
01:25:57
whatever it would be because they think
01:25:58
they're so smart in this area that they
01:26:00
must be smart in other areas a lot of
01:26:02
doctors have this problem with investing
01:26:04
where they think I'm a doctor I'm very
01:26:06
successful I got a PhD from a great
01:26:08
school therefore I can pick the stocks
01:26:10
because I'm a smart person and that
01:26:12
level of overconfidence is their undoing
01:26:14
can success I think your book the one of
01:26:16
the key things that stayed with me and I
01:26:18
didn't need to recap myself on was the
01:26:19
stories you told about people
01:26:22
that accurately predicted what was going
01:26:25
to happen in the stock market against
01:26:26
all conventional wisdom they all from
01:26:29
what I recall they went on to lose their
01:26:30
money eventually anyway a lot of them
01:26:32
yeah yeah what is that story you told in
01:26:33
your book there's a story about a guy
01:26:34
named Jesse Livermore who was back in
01:26:36
the 1920s he was the most successful
01:26:38
investor in the world and what's so
01:26:40
amazing about Jesse Livermore is that I
01:26:42
think four different occasions in his
01:26:43
life he became the equivalent of a
01:26:45
billionaire adjusted for inflation and
01:26:47
then went bankrupt four separate times
01:26:49
in his life so he was the person who was
01:26:51
like better at anyone in the world at
01:26:54
making money and had no skill whatsoever
01:26:56
at keeping money and that's someone who
01:26:59
like even when he became at one point he
01:27:01
was the richest man in the world and
01:27:03
rather than saying I have enough it's
01:27:05
enough he have said let's cap te bigger
01:27:07
bets let's swing even harder next time
01:27:09
it goes never enough and he eventually
01:27:12
the last time he went broke he
01:27:13
eventually ended up killing himself it's
01:27:15
the most amazing like just fascinating
01:27:17
life that you can imagine of someone who
01:27:19
is so good at making money but never
01:27:23
knew when to stop and it is actually the
01:27:25
more money he made the more risk he
01:27:26
wanted to take so it was always like his
01:27:29
I I think his outcome was always
01:27:32
predestined because there was never
01:27:34
going to be a moment like the Richer he
01:27:35
be the more successful he became the
01:27:37
higher the odds that he was going to
01:27:40
fail and I think there's some version of
01:27:43
that for a lot of people because it
01:27:44
because their success increases their
01:27:47
confidence more than their ability and
01:27:49
they don't even know that that's a
01:27:50
problem that you can't self diagnose
01:27:52
like if you're confident you think it's
01:27:53
earned and you think it's real and and
01:27:56
then because you're successful a lot of
01:27:58
people who when you were poorer or less
01:28:00
successful they would tell you you're
01:28:02
being an idiot you're wrong you're not
01:28:04
right about this but when you're rich
01:28:06
maybe because you employ them or because
01:28:08
they think that you're so smart even
01:28:10
when you say something stupid they might
01:28:12
go yeah maybe it's right go for it and
01:28:15
therefore you don't have people who are
01:28:16
telling you how overconfident you are
01:28:18
that again it comes down to humility
01:28:20
doesn't it a lot of it yeah and like I
01:28:22
think that's that's that's so much of it
01:28:24
and like and I think you have to go out
01:28:25
of your way sometimes for that humility
01:28:27
that when you have some level of success
01:28:29
in your life whatever that level is just
01:28:31
always remind yourself I think I
01:28:33
remember there was a quote that I think
01:28:34
it was um Roman Warriors that when they
01:28:37
would come home from a battle that they
01:28:38
won and they were in like the Parade of
01:28:42
you know like we won the battle and
01:28:43
we're going to go in the parade that
01:28:45
like we're we're the victors were so
01:28:46
great that they would have someone by
01:28:48
their side whispering in their ear
01:28:51
something something along the lines of
01:28:53
you're not that great
01:28:54
because they're in this parade where
01:28:55
they're glorious and like Victorious but
01:28:58
they need to someone to bring them back
01:28:59
down to earth and be like hey you're
01:29:01
just a you're just a dude you're just a
01:29:03
guy you're not that special you're very
01:29:05
fallible like make the like tame it down
01:29:08
they would actually hire people to do
01:29:09
that for them and I think if you look at
01:29:11
a lot of like the great entrepreneurs a
01:29:13
lot of the great investors they will
01:29:15
have some sort of partner with that
01:29:18
Charlie Munger is that to Warren Buffett
01:29:20
like when Warren Buffett comes up with
01:29:22
an idea a big part of Charlie munger's
01:29:23
job is to tell him when he's being an
01:29:24
idiot and to have someone like Warren
01:29:26
Buffett who will trust a person like
01:29:28
that and to have someone like Munger who
01:29:29
is willing to do something like that is
01:29:32
so critical just a quick Interruption
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01:31:50
from success often really does create
01:31:52
blind spots and that's something I think
01:31:53
about so much like how do I stay aware
01:31:57
of those blind spots in my life that you
01:32:00
know the success I've had in various
01:32:01
areas has undeniably created and
01:32:04
honestly a lot of I just go just save
01:32:05
loads of money Steve because the day
01:32:07
you're wrong you don't want to go broke
01:32:09
I also think about that like whenever
01:32:11
the curtain comes down on my career I
01:32:12
want to make sure that I can say like
01:32:14
hey thank you for for for letting me
01:32:18
have this I'm so grateful for it but I
01:32:20
I've saved enough that like I'm ready to
01:32:21
pass a baton to someone else and that's
01:32:24
a form of humility too there's a quote
01:32:26
from Denzel Washington where he's
01:32:27
talking to Will Smith After Will Smith
01:32:29
slapped Chris Rock remember that whole
01:32:31
debacle after that show Denzel
01:32:33
Washington comes up to Will Smith and he
01:32:34
says will when you're at your highest
01:32:36
moment in your career that's when the
01:32:38
devil's going to get you and it's like
01:32:41
when when when you when your career is
01:32:42
so high and you're so famous you think
01:32:44
so highly of yourself that you can do
01:32:45
anything that's when you're going to get
01:32:47
yourself into
01:32:48
trouble what a powerful quote and I
01:32:51
think just paying attention to that
01:32:52
that's the natural humility that goes
01:32:54
into it and it's not false humility it's
01:32:56
not like oh I you know false humility is
01:32:58
like I I didn't do any of this I just
01:33:00
got lucky that's all false humility I
01:33:02
think real humility is like I built this
01:33:04
through hard work and I made some good
01:33:06
decisions but I'm just I'm just a guy
01:33:08
I'm as fallible as anybody else I think
01:33:11
that's it's that's not just important I
01:33:12
think that's critical to any amount of
01:33:14
sustainable success you taught me that
01:33:16
the price you pay to be wealthy is the
01:33:20
volatility you have to incur along the
01:33:23
way kind of how I think about it in my
01:33:24
head that's the cost of admission to
01:33:26
being to being wealthy and to to be to
01:33:28
any level of success is putting up with
01:33:30
an enduring unknowns and volatility and
01:33:34
Booms and busts and then other [ __ ]
01:33:36
that you put up with in the investing
01:33:37
market and in your career and in your
01:33:39
relationships there's always a cost for
01:33:42
anything good in life there's a cost
01:33:44
that you have to pay like of course like
01:33:46
nothing's free like that but most of the
01:33:48
costs that you pay are not they don't
01:33:50
have a price tag that you can just
01:33:51
measure very cleanly like the cost of
01:33:54
doing well at investing is putting up
01:33:55
with volatility the cost of a successful
01:33:57
career might be long hours where you
01:33:59
were pulled away from your family the
01:34:01
cost of a relationship is like always
01:34:03
needing to sacrifice and compromise for
01:34:06
the other person nothing is ever free
01:34:08
and so much of the success in life is
01:34:10
just identifying what the cost is and
01:34:12
being willing to pay it because for all
01:34:14
of those things I just laid out
01:34:15
investing career relationships the cost
01:34:18
of admission is worth it putting up with
01:34:20
the volatility is worth it over time
01:34:23
because if you can put put up with the
01:34:24
stock market falling 30% if you could
01:34:26
just say ah it's not that big a deal I'm
01:34:27
just going to hold tight 10 years from
01:34:29
now the cost is well worth doing that be
01:34:31
rich if you can put up with the
01:34:33
compromise that takes to have a
01:34:34
successful relationship by and large
01:34:36
that's going to be a cost that's worth
01:34:38
paying because you know like so much of
01:34:40
what matters in life is just the
01:34:42
relationships that you have and once you
01:34:44
identify the cost of that relationship
01:34:46
you're like oh I'll pay that cost all
01:34:47
day long so worth it this requires you
01:34:49
to be cognizant of time Horizons and
01:34:51
your own time Horizons which is
01:34:52
something you talk a lot about in
01:34:54
chapter 16 of the psychology of money
01:34:56
why is it important for us to know our
01:34:58
time Horizons and what do you mean by
01:35:00
time Horizon it's the the amount of time
01:35:02
between now and whatever your goal is
01:35:05
which is very different for everybody
01:35:06
not just by your age but like if you
01:35:08
want to retire early or whatever would
01:35:09
be like everyone's going to have a
01:35:10
slightly different time Horizon what's
01:35:12
yours mine I mean I you would break it
01:35:14
up into different chunks like I want to
01:35:16
get to a point or maybe I'm nearing a
01:35:18
point in my career where I'm just doing
01:35:21
things because I enjoy them there's
01:35:24
really no Financial incentive to what
01:35:25
I'm doing that's one time Horizon
01:35:28
another is like okay once my kids start
01:35:31
getting older I I want to make sure that
01:35:32
like I'm always there for them when they
01:35:34
need me teenage years are so difficult
01:35:36
for people like I'm always 24/7 I'll be
01:35:39
there for you which means I'm going to
01:35:40
have to pull back there's going to be a
01:35:41
point where I just say look I've
01:35:43
accomplished what I want to with writing
01:35:45
and I want to be able to move on to
01:35:47
something else and there's going to be a
01:35:48
point where I say I really don't want to
01:35:49
work that much anymore I just want to
01:35:50
move on and maybe I need to take care of
01:35:52
my parents would it be so like there's
01:35:53
multip multile different time Horizons
01:35:54
at different goals of your life is
01:35:56
buying a house a good or bad financial
01:35:58
decision I'll tell you my own experience
01:36:00
which was in my 20s and early 30s my
01:36:03
wife and I lived in like seven different
01:36:05
cities and there was nothing better for
01:36:07
us some of those were just like let's
01:36:09
try this new city for fun some of it was
01:36:11
moving for work we moved for her school
01:36:14
and our ability to just get up and go
01:36:15
hand the keys back to the landlord
01:36:17
nothing was more valuable than that once
01:36:19
we had our son our first kid then very
01:36:22
quickly nothing became more valuable to
01:36:24
me than having an established secure
01:36:27
home base that nobody could take away
01:36:29
from me that was The Cure and also like
01:36:32
kids are loud and they scream and I
01:36:33
didn't want Neighbors in an apartment
01:36:35
building that I was going to have to
01:36:36
like try to keep my kid quiet from so I
01:36:38
was I want my own house that's mine and
01:36:40
it's just a standalone house my kid can
01:36:42
scream as loud as he wants not bothering
01:36:44
anybody else that became important to me
01:36:46
like instantly so it's Le I think people
01:36:48
get caught up when they're like well the
01:36:50
housing market returns 4 and a half% per
01:36:52
year that's it's like with the
01:36:54
spreadsheets like just do what's going
01:36:56
to work for you I know I know RIT Siti
01:36:59
has a lot of thoughts about this on
01:37:01
renting versus buying and I think one
01:37:03
one of like the differences between
01:37:05
remit and myself is I have two young
01:37:08
kids and so like that that if I didn't
01:37:10
have kids I think I would be like rent
01:37:12
rent forever really and try and try
01:37:14
different cities move all move all
01:37:15
around what could be better than that
01:37:17
but when you have kids what's more
01:37:19
important to me is stability I want my
01:37:21
kids to go to a stable School know their
01:37:23
neighbors have friends that they can be
01:37:24
friends with for years that's important
01:37:26
if we just think about investing then in
01:37:28
terms of is buying a house a good
01:37:30
Financial investment my brother who
01:37:31
works in my company and he's the one
01:37:33
that introduced me to your book many
01:37:34
many years ago said to me something
01:37:36
along the lines of Steve don't buy
01:37:40
houses to make money because you have
01:37:42
the ability to play a different set of
01:37:44
games that very few people can play yeah
01:37:47
and what I mean by that is he kind of
01:37:48
explained it to me goes listen everyone
01:37:50
can buy a house so the returns there
01:37:52
aren't going to be huge go find a game
01:37:54
that like only you can play you'll get
01:37:56
bigger returns if you're buying a house
01:37:58
because you think it's going to be a
01:37:58
good Financial investment stop like even
01:38:01
if it turns out in hindsight that it was
01:38:03
it doesn't matter I think these are just
01:38:05
purely lifestyle decisions and I think
01:38:07
so many people get screwed up when
01:38:09
they're in a spot in their life where
01:38:10
they should be renting because they need
01:38:12
to be mobile they need to move around to
01:38:13
a new job new career new school whatever
01:38:15
it is but they end up buying because
01:38:17
they think they're going to make money
01:38:18
doing it and that's like that's the
01:38:20
problem so I own a house and if I ended
01:38:22
up losing money on it I I I I don't
01:38:24
think I'd care that that's not why I'm
01:38:26
owning it I'm owning it just cuz I want
01:38:27
the stability for my family I've just
01:38:29
made an offer on my first ever house and
01:38:30
I cuz I played I played other money
01:38:32
games for the last decade of My Life um
01:38:35
and now I have a partner and we've been
01:38:36
together many years and we're both like
01:38:38
31 years old and we're getting into that
01:38:40
position now you know Y and my brother
01:38:42
explained to me he goes listen this is a
01:38:45
bad financial decision but it's a good
01:38:49
emotional social life decision and you
01:38:51
need to know how to separate the two
01:38:53
don't mark this down as a way that
01:38:54
you're trying to make money like you
01:38:56
might make money in 20 years time if you
01:38:58
just like if you're still living there
01:38:59
look at it as you know you need
01:39:01
somewhere to live and he must have got
01:39:02
that from you when I when I when we
01:39:04
bought our last house which was after I
01:39:05
wrote this book so this is a different
01:39:07
experience um I thought at the time and
01:39:10
still think today I I probably paid a
01:39:11
little bit too much I mean I paid the
01:39:12
market rate but if you said like oh did
01:39:14
you get a good deal I say no no not
01:39:16
didn't bother me in the slightest that's
01:39:17
not what I was doing it for it would I
01:39:19
mean it would be like if you ask like if
01:39:22
someone is deciding whether or not to
01:39:24
have kids and they think about the cost
01:39:26
of kids like forget of course you're
01:39:28
going to dump hundreds of thousands or
01:39:31
millions of dollars into your kids and
01:39:32
it's G it's like if if money is coming
01:39:35
into the equation like stop right there
01:39:37
this is it should not do it you're doing
01:39:38
it for very different reasons this is
01:39:40
not an investment people people buy
01:39:42
houses because they think that they're
01:39:43
making loads of money from because there
01:39:44
have been periods in time in which
01:39:45
people have made loads of money
01:39:46
historically like that's the anomaly
01:39:48
historically in the US and the UK
01:39:50
housing prices adjust over inflation go
01:39:52
nowhere it's just been the last 20 or 30
01:39:55
years that there's this very brief
01:39:56
window of time that owning a house was a
01:39:59
great investment Robert Schiller won the
01:40:01
Nobel Prize about a decade ago for his
01:40:03
work in showing that over the last 150
01:40:06
years in the United States adjusted for
01:40:08
inflation most home prices have been
01:40:10
flat as a pancake it's just the last 20
01:40:12
years that have inflated people's
01:40:14
expectations of what a house can
01:40:16
do statistically there's going to be at
01:40:18
least one person listening to this that
01:40:21
has made an offer as we speak for a
01:40:23
house under the assumption that it's
01:40:25
going to help them stack
01:40:29
wealth if they were purely doing it for
01:40:31
those reasons what would you tell them
01:40:33
to do instead if that's purely the
01:40:35
reason run for run for your life don't
01:40:37
do it particularly I mean it it used to
01:40:40
be and maybe it still is like this in
01:40:41
many cities in America in the UK but it
01:40:44
used to be that rentals were almost
01:40:46
without exception shitty houses there
01:40:49
were no good rentals a big change at
01:40:51
least in America in the last 20 years is
01:40:52
that most cities have tons and tons of
01:40:55
luxury apartments to live in and that
01:40:56
are great places to live and they're in
01:40:59
the city centers and they got beautiful
01:41:00
granite countertops and they're great
01:41:02
places to live don't fall for the idea
01:41:04
that you can't live well if you're
01:41:06
renting I think that's that's that's the
01:41:08
problem and realize that if you're doing
01:41:10
it for financial reasons you're probably
01:41:12
about to borrow a shitload of money for
01:41:15
an investment that historically has been
01:41:17
a very bad investment like if you put it
01:41:20
in those terms like what are we doing
01:41:22
here man going to borrow hundreds of
01:41:24
thousands of dollars for an investment
01:41:27
that historically has been a loss that's
01:41:29
what you're doing here does you feel
01:41:31
good about that that's what I'd say to
01:41:33
that person God
01:41:35
speed I I would love to be in the room
01:41:37
somewhere where that person has just
01:41:39
looked at their partner after persuading
01:41:42
them to make that offer because it was
01:41:43
going to make them Rich sorry guys the
01:41:45
um this new
01:41:48
book same as ever essentially it's 23
01:41:52
short stories about things that never
01:41:53
change in the world y well there's a
01:41:55
couple of really interesting things that
01:41:56
I pulled out one of them again which
01:41:58
really hit me in the face was this idea
01:42:00
that the best story wins I know this I
01:42:03
know this intuitively I talk about it on
01:42:04
stage but I don't think people
01:42:06
understand the power of the best story
01:42:09
wins because when you think about
01:42:10
entrepreneurship or investing or
01:42:11
pitching or sales what most people do is
01:42:14
they lead out with facts stats and
01:42:17
figures yeah and even one of the things
01:42:19
I've noticed about you from our
01:42:20
conversation now is you have a
01:42:21
remarkable ability to tell stor thank
01:42:23
you and there's a huge power in that
01:42:26
prove to me that the best story wins I
01:42:30
mean it's it's always the case that it's
01:42:31
not the right answer or the best answer
01:42:34
or the mathematically accurate answer
01:42:36
it's just whoever gets people to nod
01:42:37
their heads in the right direction
01:42:38
that's who's going to win over time some
01:42:40
of the examples of this that I Love Ken
01:42:42
Burns one of the most famous uh
01:42:44
documentary filmmakers of all time most
01:42:47
of what is are in his
01:42:49
documentaries is is information that
01:42:51
people already know he'll make a
01:42:52
documentary about Civil War World War II
01:42:54
Vietnam whatever it would be there's not
01:42:56
you're not learn necessarily learning
01:42:58
something new in there but he is
01:43:00
massively successful massively popular
01:43:04
because he's probably the greatest
01:43:05
Storyteller of our time so even when
01:43:07
you're taking information that people
01:43:08
already know if you can spin a good
01:43:10
story about it you get people lining up
01:43:13
and they will knock your door down to
01:43:15
listen to you one other example of this
01:43:17
are people who tell comedy if you're a
01:43:20
good comedian like that's all just
01:43:22
storytelling and a lot of what a good
01:43:23
comedian does is takes something that's
01:43:25
very obvious and simple but you can make
01:43:29
you can tell a good story about it you
01:43:30
can make people laugh and all of a
01:43:31
sudden you get their attention and
01:43:32
they'll remember it you said in the book
01:43:34
not the best idea or the right idea or
01:43:35
the most rational idea just whoever
01:43:37
tells a story that catches people's
01:43:39
attention I think there are dangerous
01:43:41
stories which is when people want to is
01:43:43
when people tell you what you want to
01:43:44
hear oh I got a dangerous story The
01:43:46
vaccine gives you autism I think I think
01:43:49
it's a story that people wanted to hear
01:43:50
some people wanted to hear that and if
01:43:52
you tell people what they want to hear
01:43:53
you can be wrong forever and people
01:43:56
won't care because you tell them what
01:43:57
they want to hear T shrot who's a
01:43:59
neuroscientist sat here and she told me
01:44:00
a story of Donald Trump stood on the
01:44:02
debate stage and they panned over to Dr
01:44:05
Tucker Carson I believe he's called and
01:44:06
asked him about the vaccine and he
01:44:08
basically gave stats facts and figures
01:44:10
He said That vaccine doesn't give kids
01:44:11
autism and then they like pan over to
01:44:13
Donald Trump and Donald Trump tells this
01:44:16
elaborate story about a friend of his
01:44:18
one person one friend of his clearly
01:44:21
doesn't exist one friend of his and he
01:44:23
describes the needle like this he goes
01:44:26
this huge needle yeah and he so vivid
01:44:29
Vivid personal and emotional yep and you
01:44:32
get people nodding their heads to that
01:44:33
and and and capturing their attention
01:44:35
tally said I'm a neuroscientist I knew
01:44:36
it was wrong however there was something
01:44:39
about hearing it that even as a
01:44:40
neuroscientist I look to my daughter and
01:44:42
go [ __ ] I think we've always been
01:44:44
storytellers and that's what's really
01:44:46
set humans apart that's the whole idea
01:44:48
from youval no Harari is that like what
01:44:49
sets humans apart is our ability to tell
01:44:51
and remember stories and it's made it so
01:44:54
it's just a tool to simplify facts in
01:44:57
the world like most people the other
01:44:58
thing is powerful about stories is that
01:45:00
you remember them you think about in
01:45:02
school when you had a math test and the
01:45:04
teacher just said memorize this formula
01:45:07
to regurgitate it on the test literally
01:45:09
5 minutes after the test is done you
01:45:10
forget it you have no idea what it was
01:45:12
but if you remembered a good story even
01:45:14
that you were told when you were two
01:45:15
years old you remember it for the rest
01:45:17
of your life so it's just a tool for
01:45:20
getting people to remember how the world
01:45:21
works and they be so persuasive and so
01:45:25
good at eliminating the uncertainty that
01:45:28
grates on all of us that people will
01:45:30
listen to and believe things even when
01:45:32
they're just obviously flagrantly not
01:45:34
true if it's what they want to hear
01:45:36
people talk about um when we're talking
01:45:39
about investing but generally life
01:45:40
people talk about compounding interest
01:45:42
and we all know the I think a lot of
01:45:43
people should know the power of
01:45:44
compounding interest now but we rarely
01:45:47
think about how compounding interest can
01:45:49
negatively slowly impact our lives and
01:45:52
in your chapter about tiny and
01:45:54
magnificent you explore that and again
01:45:56
this hit me like a truck in the face
01:45:58
because I I think I spend my time now
01:46:00
thinking about how getting things to
01:46:02
compound in my fa favor will change my
01:46:04
life but I don't spend a huge amount of
01:46:05
time thinking about how things are
01:46:06
compounding against me right now yeah
01:46:08
what what's really true is that most
01:46:10
good news happens slowly and most bad
01:46:12
news happens very fast so bad news is
01:46:15
like Co literally happens overnight boom
01:46:17
you got a you got a virus it's going to
01:46:18
kill millions of people shut down the
01:46:20
economy happens literally overnight 911
01:46:22
Happ happens start to finish it's like
01:46:24
30 minutes like boom just happens
01:46:25
immediately good news is usually slow
01:46:28
compounding over time so I use the
01:46:30
example of the book of like the
01:46:31
Improvement in heart disease mortality
01:46:34
over the last 70 years is Bonkers we've
01:46:36
made so much progress and saved
01:46:39
literally tens of millions of lives in
01:46:41
the fact that we've gotten better at
01:46:43
treating heart disease and but nobody
01:46:45
talks about it it's like it most people
01:46:48
are aren't even aware that it's happened
01:46:49
because if you look at what happened it
01:46:51
was the mortality improved it got better
01:46:53
by about 2% per year now if you compound
01:46:55
2% per year for 70 years it's off the
01:46:58
charts we're like living in such a
01:47:00
better world now than we were 70 years
01:47:01
ago but in any given year you didn't
01:47:03
even notice it you're never going to see
01:47:05
a news headline like breaking news heart
01:47:07
disease mortality improves by 1.4%
01:47:09
that's not a headline like all the
01:47:11
headlines are bad news because bad news
01:47:13
happens fast so once you realize that
01:47:15
then it's like most of the news is going
01:47:18
to skew negative not because there's
01:47:20
some producer who's trying to toy with
01:47:21
your brain it's just because what is
01:47:24
obviously happening today tends to be
01:47:26
the bad news where the good news is just
01:47:28
very slowly compounding over
01:47:31
time that can go in the other direction
01:47:33
of like bad news that compounds over
01:47:35
time I think about our health smoking
01:47:37
Health like that's like in like one
01:47:39
cigarette is not going to do anything
01:47:41
bad for you but one cigarette per day
01:47:43
for 30 years is catastrophic and so
01:47:46
that's that's really what it is like
01:47:47
same with like getting one bad night
01:47:48
sleep not that big a deal but if you're
01:47:50
sleeping 6 hours a night every night for
01:47:53
years on end you're going to reduce your
01:47:54
life expectancy by a tremendous amount
01:47:56
this idea of compounding interest and
01:47:58
compounding returns and how important it
01:48:00
is I've spent so long trying to explain
01:48:02
to people that compounding interest and
01:48:04
compounding returns this very hard thing
01:48:06
to think about is so important I imagine
01:48:09
you have two what is your go-to way of
01:48:11
explaining to like your eight-year-old
01:48:13
kid or someone else the power of
01:48:15
compounding we were actually going to
01:48:16
get like a bowl of rice here and I was
01:48:17
going to do some experiments the rice is
01:48:19
the best the the rice board experiment
01:48:20
if you if people aren't familiar with it
01:48:22
it's this story that's probably not true
01:48:24
that back 500 years ago someone uh you
01:48:27
know told the king they said hey here's
01:48:29
a here's a chess board I'm going to put
01:48:31
one grain of rice on the
01:48:33
first Square two on the second Square
01:48:36
four on the third and then let's do that
01:48:38
and by the end of the chessboard that's
01:48:41
like it's like more rice than exists in
01:48:43
the entire world because like if you
01:48:44
double something again and again and
01:48:46
again it's just completely
01:48:47
counterintuitive how big it can grow the
01:48:49
one way that I I I had a friend of mine
01:48:51
Michael batnick explained this to me
01:48:52
years ago I think he wrote this in a
01:48:54
blog post he said if I ask you what is 8
01:48:57
plus 8 plus 8 plus 8 you can do that in
01:48:59
your head like it's it's not it's not
01:49:01
that hard but if I say what is 8 time 8
01:49:03
time 8 time 8 like forget about it even
01:49:05
if you are really mathematically
01:49:07
inclined there's no way you can like
01:49:09
very few people could figure that out in
01:49:10
their head so our minds are just not
01:49:13
good at exponential thinking that's just
01:49:15
not it's it's just not something that
01:49:16
we're really geared towards doing like 8
01:49:18
plus 8 plus 8 it's like so simple linear
01:49:20
thinking so simple exponential thinking
01:49:22
not intuitive in the slightest and
01:49:24
because it's not intuitive it's so
01:49:25
common to underestimate what smoking is
01:49:28
going to do to you that compounds over
01:49:30
time what investing is capable of doing
01:49:32
to your wealth because it's so
01:49:34
counterintuitive that 99% of Warren
01:49:36
Buffett's net worth came after he was 60
01:49:38
years old not intuitive at all and so
01:49:41
since exponential thinking is not
01:49:43
intuitive both on the positive and the
01:49:44
negative side we go through life
01:49:47
underestimating what's going to happen
01:49:49
to us in good things and bad things it's
01:49:50
like a religion we have to adopt I think
01:49:52
I think that's a great way it's it's
01:49:53
like a mathematical religion because
01:49:56
just like a lot of religion it's like
01:49:57
it's not intuitive and it almost takes
01:49:58
like a leap of faith to be like I know
01:50:00
it's seems crazy but this is this is
01:50:02
what I believe I think there's a sense
01:50:04
of that to compounding where like it's
01:50:06
just math you can just put the numbers
01:50:07
in a spreadsheet and they'll tell you
01:50:08
what it is but since it's not intuitive
01:50:11
there's almost like a religious aspect
01:50:12
that you need to believe how powerful it
01:50:14
can be over time two of the chapters in
01:50:16
your book same is ever speak to the
01:50:17
importance of discomfort one of the
01:50:20
chapters is called when the magic
01:50:21
happens and you say in that chapter
01:50:22
stress pain discomfort shock and disgust
01:50:24
for all its tragic
01:50:26
downsides it's also when the magic
01:50:29
happens and then the other chapter where
01:50:31
you kind of speak to this is It's
01:50:32
supposed to be hard most things worth
01:50:34
pursuing charge their fee in the form of
01:50:36
stress uncertainty dealing with quirky
01:50:39
people bureaucracy other people's
01:50:41
conflicting incentives hassle nonsense
01:50:43
long hours and constant doubt that's the
01:50:45
overhead cost of getting ahead what's
01:50:47
interesting is I never tied those two
01:50:48
chapters together but you're right
01:50:49
they're they're almost the exact same
01:50:51
idea that for the the whole economy for
01:50:53
the whole world when the biggest
01:50:54
improvements in society takes place is
01:50:56
when there's some sort of disaster like
01:50:58
for all of its obvious downside and
01:51:01
death and destruction nothing has been
01:51:03
more technologically Progressive for the
01:51:05
world than World War II the number of
01:51:07
inventions that came out of World War II
01:51:09
from atomic energy to Jets and like go
01:51:12
on down the list penicillin all of these
01:51:14
lists for things that you and I are
01:51:16
taking advantage of today happened not
01:51:18
in spite of but because of World War II
01:51:20
because there was this period where
01:51:21
everyone in the world came together and
01:51:23
they're like holy [ __ ] we got a big
01:51:24
problem to figure out let's put our
01:51:26
heads together and figure this out right
01:51:27
now but that's also on a personal level
01:51:29
on a personal level it happens as well
01:51:30
too like there there's there's there's a
01:51:32
book written many years ago called the
01:51:34
upside of down that's I thought that
01:51:36
just a brilliant title like the like the
01:51:37
upside of being down and it happens a
01:51:40
lot that when you have maybe it's a job
01:51:41
layoff or a breakup or a medical
01:51:43
emergency whatever it can be that it
01:51:45
changes you for the good and it's hard
01:51:48
it's always impossible to see that
01:51:49
silver lining in the moment you don't
01:51:51
ever imagine there's going be a silver
01:51:53
lining in that moment but when you look
01:51:55
back in hindsight it will be I saw this
01:51:57
recent example of this that really
01:51:58
knocked me on my ass it was Steven coar
01:52:01
who I might be getting these details
01:52:02
wrong but I think when he was uh a young
01:52:05
child his father and brother died
01:52:08
tragically and he said at one point that
01:52:12
uh I don't want to put words in his
01:52:13
mouth but he said something along the
01:52:14
lines of like he is grateful for that
01:52:17
and he was asked like what do you mean
01:52:18
you're grateful for that and he said
01:52:19
look of course I wish it never happened
01:52:22
but it allowed him to understand the
01:52:26
emotions of other people and get closer
01:52:27
to other people who had also experience
01:52:29
something like that and so even in like
01:52:31
the deepest darkest moment of his life
01:52:34
that he says he of course he wishes it
01:52:35
didn't happen it taught him something
01:52:36
about Humanity that he's Greatful for
01:52:38
today that's an extreme example but I
01:52:41
think for a lot of people being laid off
01:52:43
from a job in the moment is going to be
01:52:45
the hardest thing they've ever dealt
01:52:46
with and in hindsight it's going to be
01:52:48
one of the best things that ever
01:52:49
happened to their career a breakup might
01:52:51
be the hardest thing you've ever been
01:52:52
through and in hindsight it might be the
01:52:54
best thing that's ever happened to you
01:52:56
so I that's always like that's when the
01:52:58
magic happens is when things get really
01:52:59
tough It's just always impossible to see
01:53:01
that when you're going through it a lot
01:53:03
of people would have clicked on to this
01:53:04
conversation and if they've gotten to
01:53:05
the end of the conversation well done to
01:53:07
them what conclusion can we offer them
01:53:10
based on everything we've talked about
01:53:11
as it specifically relates to wealth
01:53:14
creation and money first I think for
01:53:16
both of these books we're almost ending
01:53:18
exactly where we started which is like I
01:53:20
hope they get you to think about your
01:53:22
life in different way both of these
01:53:24
books and the Publishers hated this
01:53:26
there's no advice in the books never do
01:53:28
I say and therefore you should do this
01:53:31
and the publisher wants you to do that
01:53:32
and I said no no no because I don't know
01:53:34
you I don't know the person reading this
01:53:35
book who am I to say what you should do
01:53:37
with your own life I don't even know to
01:53:38
do with my own life but I hope it gets
01:53:40
you thinking about what you want and who
01:53:43
you are and what you are capable of what
01:53:46
you're not capable of if it gets you
01:53:48
thinking about your life then I think
01:53:50
I've been successful doing this rather
01:53:52
other than trying to assume that I can
01:53:53
give you specific advice about what to
01:53:55
do Morgan we have a closing tradition on
01:53:58
this podcast where the last guest leaves
01:53:59
a question for the next guest not
01:54:00
knowing who they're going to be leaving
01:54:01
it for and the question that's been left
01:54:03
for you
01:54:05
is what is your biggest regret in life
01:54:08
and how has that experience changed
01:54:12
you I think I've uh always been prone to
01:54:17
mild depression not not significant but
01:54:20
mild depression and anxiety and I wish I
01:54:23
could go back to different periods of my
01:54:25
life in a time machine and just say it's
01:54:28
going to be okay it's not going to be
01:54:30
easy it's not going to be perfect but
01:54:32
it's gonna it's it's going to be fine
01:54:34
and I I I look back not with regret but
01:54:38
how much time have I wasted worrying
01:54:39
about things that never happened and
01:54:42
were almost certainly never going to
01:54:43
happen a tremendous amount and even if I
01:54:47
recognize that today I know I'm going to
01:54:49
worry about something tonight and
01:54:51
tomorrow and next week about something I
01:54:52
really shouldn't be worrying about I
01:54:54
don't know if I regret it because I
01:54:55
think having a sense of worry has kept
01:54:57
me safe A lot of times it's kept me out
01:54:59
of trouble in in a lot of things but I
01:55:01
do look back at the course of my life
01:55:03
and think man like I could have been
01:55:05
happier than I was if I had accepted a
01:55:09
certain level of just telling myself
01:55:10
it's going to be
01:55:12
okay well you're not going to have to
01:55:13
worry about your book because it's
01:55:15
superb thank you genuinely I I you know
01:55:18
hope my audience trust me um but I I
01:55:20
would really implore them to get both
01:55:22
books I mean the psychology of money I
01:55:23
think is the best book on money ever
01:55:24
written it's pretty much also the only
01:55:26
book I've ever read on money and then
01:55:28
same as ever is
01:55:30
just it's everything it's advice on
01:55:33
money life relationships everything that
01:55:35
matters because there are a set of
01:55:36
enduring principles that speak to the
01:55:39
fundamentals of life in a way that is
01:55:41
completely enduring you have a wonderful
01:55:42
ability to write enduring things and you
01:55:44
tell wonderful stories like you say I
01:55:46
actually didn't even notice that you
01:55:47
didn't give me advice when you said that
01:55:48
You' not given me advice any and I never
01:55:50
will to anybody bullshitting but you
01:55:51
know think about it you didn't I I
01:55:53
garnered my advice from the stories you
01:55:55
told and the evidence you provided
01:55:57
Morgan thank you so much I'm so glad we'
01:55:58
managed to have this conversation and
01:55:59
it's been a huge honor and pleasure um
01:56:02
to meet you thank you as well because I
01:56:04
can't imagine how many millions of
01:56:05
pounds you've Saved Me by writing this
01:56:06
book genuinely it's such an honor to do
01:56:09
this with you Stephen this been a lot of
01:56:10
fun thank
01:56:13
you as you'll know this podcast is
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sponsored by hu and we're going into
01:56:17
that last quarter of the year it's
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getting a little bit colder back into
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and it's in those moments that I need to
01:56:25
focus most on my diet as I get back into
01:56:27
the swing of work I need to get back
01:56:28
into a routine as it relates to my diet
01:56:30
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01:56:47
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description below I know you'll enjoy it
01:57:19
[Music]
01:57:22
a