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welcome to the best interest podcast where we believe Benjamin Franklin's advice that an investment in knowledge
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pays the best interest both in finances and in your life every episode teaches you personal finance and investing in
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simple terms now here's your host Jesse Kramer hello and welcome to episode 98
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of the best interest podcast my name is Jesse Kramer later in today's episode we
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have a repeat guest doc G Jordan grummet who was originally here on episode 61 of
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the best interest podcast is coming back for round two today he's going to be
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talking to us a little bit about some of the research that he's been doing recently some of the writing he's been
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doing recently all about purpose because a lot of this financial planning personal finance investing stuff we do
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like what's it all for what's the point of it all well it's to live our life and
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to that we need to understand a little bit about purpose to understand what drives us there but first we have a
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review of the week from Blue Horizon King who left a five-star review on Apple podcast and wrote a crisp overview
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to your personal finance queries I got introduced to the best interest podcast by another great one the long-term
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investor hosted by Peter lazerov and yeah there little note from Jesse here that is a terrific podcast Peter's been
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here on the best interest and I've been on Peter's podcast now back to the
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review I love Jesse's simple yet thorough analysis of complex Financial topics which helped me a lot and I'm
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sure many others to answer some of my long-standing queries on ideal investment portfolios retirement
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planning safe withdrawal rates tax optimization and much more I love your show it's content the style of delivery
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and I'm thankful that you share your great knowledge with us kudos to your passion and all the very best to the
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best interest well Blue Horizon King thank you so much for those kind words and as always please feel free to shoot
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me an email to Jesse best bestin interest. blog and I'll get you hooked up with a super soft bestest t-shirt to
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say thank you now before Jordan comes on and even before that usually I would do
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a little monologue I'll do a little monologue today but before we get to the
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monologue I want to make a quick special announcement this is episode 98 which means we are two episodes away from
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episode 100 which you know here in our base 10 numerical system thanks to the Romans that's a big number for us so
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we're going to do something fun and special for episode 100 it'll be fun and
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kind of a unique content for the episode that I think you guys will enjoy we're
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going to do a minor bit of rebranding for episode 100 I don't want to give away the secret too soon the best
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interest will still exist in some form or fashion here but the podcast might look and be titled slightly differently
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moving forward after episode 100 and I'll explain why when that episode comes
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out but anyway I just want to uh do a little bit of advertising and marketing beforehand to get you listeners excited
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for what should be a fun and interesting and hopefully enjoyable episode and a celebratory episode coming up soon on
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episode 100 of the podcast now before we get to Jordan today I've got some thoughts on purpose I'm going to chime
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in with a little bit of my thoughts and then we're going to hear what Jordan the
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real expert has to say about it we want to start with The Human Condition we're
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going deep we're diving straight into the deep end The Human Condition it's
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one of those grand mysterious ideas that philosophers have pondered for centuries
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and Poets have tried to capture in verse but I think if we're honest with ourselves if you're anything like most
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of us you've probably thought about it more than once while lying awake at 3:00
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a.m. wondering what the heck you're doing with your life what is this whole purpose thing about anyway why do we
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wake up every morning you know we brush our teeth we make our coffee we we put our clothes on we start getting on that
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treadmill of life we drive to work we hustle all day we wait in line for a pootle bowl at night what's the point of
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it all sure we get some answers from books from religion maybe from a motivational podcast or two I'm not
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doing much motivating here on the best interest I'm a little more informational
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than motivational but anyway at the end of the day the truth is it's not always
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as clear as we'd like it to be that purpose the meaning of life The Human Condition it's not always clear as we'd
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like it to be that kind of leads us to this eternal as far as uh the human race goes this Eternal Quest for purpose
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humans are hardwired to seek purpose if we didn't have that drive to find meaning we might just be floating around
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like jellyfish drifting wherever the current takes us but no our brains for good or bad for better or worse we want
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more we want to make sense of our existence we want to know why we're here what our role is and what we're supposed
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to be doing with this crazy thing called life not just about the ambition and that search for purpose it's not just
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about personal ambition or career it's a question that's gwed at hum Minds for
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ages to some extent it's the question of why do we exist how do we exist in the
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first place and for most of us that search can feel like a maze it stretches on for Miles there's no map there's no
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GPS we chase our career goals we Chase relationships we seek personal growth we definitely seek societal approval and
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even after we tick off all of those success boxes we still wonder is this it or maybe we move the goal posts even
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further away right we have to go PA more boxes to tick off and if we take a moment and we think of all the advice
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that people throw our way to follow our passion or to live your truth or the secret to life is love and relationships
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it all sounds nice but sometimes it feels like those are just clever sound bites meant to get us to buy a self-
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health book or sign up for some pricey retreat in Bali to do the things that that really unlock the meaning of life
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or so we're led to believe or are those just ways to distract ourselves from
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some bigger existential Harder To answer question now the tricky part or one of the tricky Parts I suppose about purpose
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is that it's simply different for everybody some people find it in their career right they're doctors their
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Engineers their artists and that practician that career has paved a clear path for them and they're deeply
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fulfilled by it other people might find purpose in raising a family or in making
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a difference in their Community or simply in the pursuit of just personal peace and happiness you know some people
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find a lot of purpose in meditation of just calming themselves Within but the kicker at the end of the day is
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that it's not always immediately obvious what our purpose is sometimes you don't
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even know what you're looking for until you find it and sometimes you can spend
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years wandering aimlessly hoping something or someone or anything or anyone will give you that aha moment
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that I found it that I've found my purpose philosophers have long argued about whether life has inherent meaning
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or if we must create it ourselves on one end you've got an existentialist like
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Jean Paul SRA who believed that life is is absurd and we're just kind of thrown
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into existence with no real reason we have to create our own meaning sarra would say that sounds Bleak but for some
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people it's also a little bit liberating right you are the architect of your life
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you decide what's meaningful you decide what brings value and then there are
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people who would argue that meaning comes from something greater than us it could be religion it could be nature it
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could be the universe itself some people believe in a higher power and that their
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life's meaning is already mapped out for them waiting for them to follow it and
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hey if that's the lens you choose to wear then life can feel like a pretty beautiful tapestry of connections and
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signs and experiences that all Point towards something more profound than that day-to-day grind that you're going
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through I get it let's not forget the fact that the search for meaning can sometimes lead us to go to unexpected
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places for some people meaning doesn't always come in Grand Cosmic Events maybe
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meaning comes in small seemingly insignificant moments a shared laugh with a friend the sound of waves
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crashing against the shore the satisfaction of finishing a project you've poured your heart into maybe
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finishing a podcast episode hey personally I will say when I walk outside at night and it's like a cold
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snowy Upstate New York night and I look up and I see you know the Stars against the night sky it does kind of bring
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things into focus and I I feel something in that moment that's a little hard to
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put your finger on but it's definitely a unique feeling and I think it's in line
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with what we're talking about here whatever it is life's meaning might not
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be some elusive unreachable prize but it's something that's found in just the
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most ordinary moments I think that's something that David Foster Wallace if you've heard me talk about many times
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here on the podcast it's something he has talked about in many different ways
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including in that very famous speech that I love this is water now here's an
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interesting thought can the search for purpose and meaning itself become meaningful could it be that the
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searching not necessarily the finding becomes the most profound part of being a Human After All if we're handed the
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answers on a silver platter that's kind of boring the struggle the uncertainty
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the constant shifting of our desires and our aspirations that might be where the
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richness of life actually lies the greatest novels the most celebrated films the best songs they're all about
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people navigating some form of existential crisis Luke Skywalker at the beginning of Star Wars right what's he
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going to do with his life well he goes out and seeks Adventure okay it could be a hero trying to find their Destiny or
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an ordinary person figuring out just how to live authentically these stories resonate with us because they tap into
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our shared Human Experience maybe our search for purpose and meaning isn't about reaching a final destination but
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rather about embracing the journey maybe it's about staying curious about remaining open to new ideas to New
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Perspectives about diving into the unknown right searching for something new or just enjoying the ride along the
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way because let's face it if we figured it all out life would lose a little bit
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of its mystery a little bit of its glitter and we'd miss out on the joy of Discovery it's also worth considering
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that maybe the search for purpose and meaning is something that evolves over time right it's not a one-time thing
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that you check off your list once you figured it out it's kind of like a financial plan right it's not a onetime
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thing it's ongoing as we grow our sense of purpose changes what felt meaningful
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when we were 18 might not be the same as 25 or 33 or 40 or 50 and Beyond and that's okay life can be fluid our
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experiences our relationships our personal growth they all shift and so too should our understanding of what
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truly matters perhaps that's the beauty of being really human the search itself
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it's an ongoing Adventure it's one that never really ends we evolve and as we do
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our relationship with purpose and meaning it evolves too each chapter of life has its own flavor of these things
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right each each season of life and that's something worth celebrating in and of itself maybe we shouldn't stress
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too much about finding the ultimate purpose quote unquote or the meaning of life maybe the key to the human
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condition is embracing the mystery the uncertainty the possibility that we might not ever have all the answers and
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that's okay that's perfectly fine instead just keep on searching keep questioning keep finding joy in the
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little day-to-day moments because in the end it's not about having it all figured
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out it's about living fully while we still can and if that answer isn't quite
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good enough for you I understand but if you're ever in doubt just remember even
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the greatest minds they haven't figured it out either here's a quick ad and then
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we'll get back to the show every week I send a quick free email to thousands of
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readers that shares three Simple Things One my new articles and podcasts two the
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best financial content of the week from all over the Internet and three a financial chart that explains some
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important Concept in the news that week it's a great primer to boost your financial knowhow but Jessie I don't
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want another email well this might not be for you but I do hear you which is why I make it very short sweet and full
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of only the essentials a whopping 66% of subscribers read my email at least once
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a month they're enjoying it and maybe you will too you can subscribe for free
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on the homepage at bestter interest. blog again that's a free no strings attached subscription at bestin
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interest. blog now those are just my thoughts but to hear some more profound thoughts and to be honest some thoughts
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that I think you really can apply into your life we're going to bring on Jordan
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grummet here Jordan grummet doc G as he's better known he found the spark to
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become a doctor a medical doctor after a deeply personal event reshaped his life's trajectory the unexpected loss of
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his father who was an oncologist ignited a passion within Jordan to practice medicine himself and it instilled a
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unique vantage point that later melded seamlessly with his financial expertise this convergence of roles Financial
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expert and doctor has spurred him to explore profound Notions like wealth abundance and financial independence
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with a thoughtful and critical lens in August of 2022 Jordan's literary Pursuit
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took shape in his book taking stock a hospice doctor's advice on financial Independence Building Wealth and living
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a regret-free life it was published in August 22 by uh ulyses press and now his second book called The purpose code will
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be published in January 2025 in fact by the time you're hearing these words as
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I'm speaking here in December if I'm being honest with you the book actually
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might be out or it soon will be out by the time you're hearing these words so
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look up the purpose code published by Herman House Press Jordan's Journey intertwines medical insight and
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financial wisdom resonating deeply with those seeking a balanced meaningful life
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and without further Ado here is Jordan grummet dog for a second time on the best interest podcast
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Jordan thank you for joining us again here on the best interest podcast today and I want to set the stage a little bit
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for our listeners because we we've got an interesting unique topic today and my
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understanding is that the Genesis of this topic came to you in a pretty unique way uh and for listeners who
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don't know Jordan's a very popular speaker at personal finance conferences
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at investing conferences and you know you you speak at in a lot of public forums and you you noticed a pattern
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that people were coming up to you after some of your talks after some of your speeches and sure I'm sure a lot of
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people were thankful intrigued but some people would come up to you angry and and you notice this pattern over time
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what were these people angry about well let me set this up for you so for those of you who don't know me I am a
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physician who burned out in medicine discovered personal finance realized I could step away but only kept one part
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of medicine which was filling me up which was being a hospice doctor dealing with DET terminally ill and so I dove
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into personal finance I started a personal finance podcast and I would have these Financial Independence people
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on these business people on these people who are kind of Masters of their Universe making lots of money and I'd
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ask them okay what's enough and what's your why behind all this and I got a lot
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of blank stairs and what I realized is that my patients on my deathbeds could talk to me about regrets and all the all
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they wish they had done in life and that type of information was exactly what all
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my personal finance people needed to hear what is important in life it's certainly not making millions of dollars
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and it's not working those nights and weekends what my people on their deathbeds were saying is I really regret
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that I didn't do X Y and Z I really regret I didn't live a life that was
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more unique to who I am and what I care about and so I wrote a book called taking stock which was all about what
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the dying could teach us about money and life and a main premise of that book is
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that we should really put our purpose first and build a financial living or build the financial framework around it
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so I went to take this message to the people I went to a bunch of conferences and I talked and marketed I talked about
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and marketed in my book and people would come up at the end of my talk and they'd
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be angry and the first time this happened I thought it was just a one-off but it kept happening over and over
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again and people would look at me and say you know this is wonderful and everything but you keep on telling me I
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need to find my purpose and I've been looking for my purpose forever I don't
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know what it is in fact I'm so frustrated I don't think there is a purpose so will you please stop telling
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me to find my purpose this of course made me do a big deep dive into purpose I looked at all the scientific
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literature and information I found out two things and they seem to contradict each other first and foremost purpose in
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life is associated with health longevity and happiness tons of studies very very
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clear on the other hand I found other studies that show that up to 91% of people at some point in their life get
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something called purpose anxiety this idea that finding their purpose causes stress and causes them to be frustrated
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and they actually end up depressed and not happy so this was a paradox and I set out to resolve this Paradox and I
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came to the conclusion that we just totally get purpose wrong it's not one thing it's most likely two and one of
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those is more associated with anxiety and the other is more associated with health happiness and Longevity and so I
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set out to write this book The purpose code to help people pursue the right version of purpose uh so they could be
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happier I know in the book you call them kind of the capital P and the Little P purpose and you explained them really
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well in the book but can you talk to us a little bit about maybe some examples of or just think of someone going
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through life what's the two examples of those different types of purpose I can
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give you 100% example based on me right so let's talk about the two different
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types of purpose they are big p purpose and Little P purpose big p purpose is Big audacious purpose Associated mostly
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with goals usually because we live in America these are Big audacious goals like if you can think it you can build
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it so we're talking about becoming a billionaire we're talking about curing
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cancer we're talking about traveling to the Moon all these big things we dream
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that we can build usually they're very goal oriented They're All or Nothing
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they're very easy to fail and the problem is most of us don't have agency
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to actually achieve them we're not the right people at the right time saying
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the right things with a good deal of luck and maybe the right genetics so the problem with this kind of purpose is
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it's really easy to fail and therefore it's more scarcity mindset oriented only
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a few people are going to get there let's compare that to Little P purpose which is process Orient ented not goal
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oriented therefore it is very abundant think about the million things you can enjoy the process of doing instead of
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all or nothing this is all or all it's almost impossible to fail so let me give
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you an example me and podcasting let's compare and contrast I love podcasting
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it is my little p purpose when I get behind the microphone and get to interview someone it lights me up even
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if I produce that episode put it out there and no one listens to it I still think it was a really good hour that I
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spent interviewing someone but let's turn that into big p purpose let's say I
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decide that I want to get a million downloads every month that is big audacious purpose that's really really
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difficult the problem is How likely is it that I'm going to get there to do that I have to be the right person at
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the right time saying the right things I probably have to put a decent amount of
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money and time into it I probably have to be a little bit lucky like did I get interviewed by someone big or did I get
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mentioned in the newspaper that's big audacious purpose and the problem is to
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get there I might have to start doing things I don't like so I'm not a big fan
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of social media but if I really want to have a million downloads a month I'm G
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to have to get on social media all the time maybe I'm G to have to write a newsletter and you know what I don't
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want to write a newsletter I don't enjoy doing that so I could spend my time
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doing things I really don't like doing to get to this goal it's big p purpose
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if I don't get to the goal I'm going to be frustrated and I'm going to film my
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time with activities I don't love so it's not going to feel very great but
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let's say I get there so I spent 90% my time abandoning what I love which is
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that 1 hour of interviewing and instead doing social media and writing newsletters all these things I don't
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love so I spent all this time doing things I don't love I get to the million
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downloads and I'm happy but how long am I happy for a day a week a year at some
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point I habituate back down to my level of happiness I was at before and then I'm back to figuring well what am I
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going to now get two million downloads a month and then I'm back on that treadmill doing things I don't like what
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happens is I end up spending most of my time I'm not enjoying myself in pursuit
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of this goal that only makes me happy for a short period of time and so that's
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the difference between big p purpose and little PE purpose and I hear people saying yeah but don't you want to
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improve yourself don't you want to grow and so I'd say certainly and while doing
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my little p purpose I love interviewing people I can go and try to make incremental gain things that I have
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agency over so maybe I want to become a better interviewer so I can listen to all sorts of really good interviewers on
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podcast I can take a class on interviewing people I can read up on the blogs and listen to the podcast about
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interviewing people and I probably will make some incremental gain so that's
00:20:05
something I have agency over but if I say I want a million more downloads I have much less agency over that and in
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fact the activities I need to do to achieve that are probably not as joyful and so that's a good example of what big
00:20:18
p purpose looks like versus Little P purpose and just so I'm clear maybe so the listeners are clear it sound if my
00:20:25
definitions are correct you were saying that a lot of the anxiety we feel over our purpose is tied to the big p purpose
00:20:32
because it is so much out of our control is that right it is it is and we all have purpose anxiety because of this and
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so a lot of people question well why do we get purpose anxiety like why is it so
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common MH well if you look at it our society is pushing us towards big p purpose let me give you three examples
00:20:49
yeah influencers if you watch Tik Tok or Instagram you're going to see a bunch of
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influencers and what are they going to show you images of they're going to show
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you images of pack abs and wearing the most expensive clothes and traveling to Exotic countries and running seven fig
00:21:06
businesses they're not doing that for you they're trying to get you to co-opt
00:21:10
their version of purpose so they can sell you something so you'll either follow them or you'll buy whatever
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they're advertising it's not meant for you but it is selling you this version
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of purpose let's look at marketing and advertising same thing it used to be we
00:21:25
watched TV and there were commercials but now there's commercials on everything but what are advertisers
00:21:29
trying to sell you they're putting these images in front of your face of people
00:21:32
doing these fantastic amazing things to sell you a lifestyle so you will co-opt that version of purpose so you'll buy
00:21:39
the thing but it's not just social media not just inter influencers and advertisers it's even your family in
00:21:45
society your family is trying to sell you this vision of your parents are trying to get you to become a CPA or a
00:21:50
doctor or a lawyer or some kind of big version of career achievement or they're
00:21:57
trying to get you not to make the same mistakes they made and so they're giving
00:22:00
you this big audacious purpose it is very stressful for your average young person because we're being sold this
00:22:07
version of purpose and it's coming from everywhere but the problem is most of
00:22:13
the time that version of purpose is very hard to achieve and usually it's someone
00:22:17
else's version of purpose and not yours and because of that that's very anxiety-provoking it's pervasive in
00:22:25
society today here's a quick ad and and then we'll get back to the show one of
00:22:30
the more common questions I hear is Jesse what do you like in use books blogs podcasts even Banks and brokerage
00:22:37
firms what are your recommendations so to answer that question I put together a web page you can check it out at bestter
00:22:45
interest. blogrecommended to check out how I'm improving my financial life what are some experiments
00:22:57
or I don't to say lessons or I'm thinking of something actionable that someone can take and maybe you dive into
00:23:04
this in the book a little bit about okay let me try to sit down here as I am before you Jordan and and let me try to
00:23:09
identify what I think my big p purpose is or at least what I've told myself so
00:23:14
far what my big p purpose is but then ideally especially if it is anxiety-provoking I want to hone in on
00:23:22
something that is much more my true big p purpose or or perhaps it's less audacious it's more reasonable and
00:23:29
therefore it it just naturally will be less anxiety-provoking is there anything we can do on that front first and
00:23:34
foremost there's nothing good about big PE purpose so you do not want big p purpose because big p purpose is very
00:23:39
goal oriented and enough and is very frustrating what you really want is Little P purpose so the question I get
00:23:44
all the time is how do I find my purpose so the first thing I say is you don't
00:23:48
find your purpose you build or create it so this is a very active process where you actually have to do the work so you
00:23:56
don't find it you create it but a lot of people say well I don't know what
00:24:01
excites me so it is true you have to have an idea of what those inklings those beckoning are to things that you
00:24:07
might find Joyful and then build purpose around those those are what I call purpose anchors so what people really
00:24:13
want to find out is well how do I identify my purpose anchor so I can build a life of purpose around them and
00:24:20
they're really some basic easy ways to do this when you lower the stakes when
00:24:25
it's not like I have to find this one big thing that's either going to make me
00:24:29
a happy person or I won't find it and everything else fails when we lower those stakes and say no you're just
00:24:35
looking for a few things you might enjoy doing and then you're going to build
00:24:37
purpose around them it becomes really easy so let me give you three or four examples of an easy way to find your
00:24:44
purpose anchors I always talk about with my hospice patients the Life review it's
00:24:48
a structured series of questions we ask them about their lives this is biggest successes biggest failures helps them
00:24:54
come to terms with their life but a big part of that is regrets and so for young
00:24:58
young people I'd really love to look at regrets what does regret feel like to
00:25:02
you when you're on your dying bed it's really disappointing because you don't
00:25:05
have the energy time or ability to really change things you don't have agency but what does regret look like to
00:25:10
a young healthy person who has years and years ahead of them that looks like a purpose anchor to me find what you
00:25:16
regret turn it around think of that as an anchor of purpose and then build a life of purpose around it so regret is a
00:25:23
great way to start thinking about purpose aners the joys of childhood often when we're kids kids we have all
00:25:29
these things we love doing we go out into the world and do these joyful things all day we lose track of time
00:25:34
we're not worried about the goal we just like to play and then all of a sudden we
00:25:38
get older and we start talking about career and we drop all those things so think about what your childhood room
00:25:44
look like what were the trophies what were the drawings what were the posters usually we kind of know what we like as
00:25:51
a kid and eventually drop it but if you're looking for a sense of purpose in
00:25:55
your adult life think about what you liked as a kid I loved B cards even today every time I look on Facebook or I
00:26:01
read an article that has anything to do with baseball or baseball cards my brain
00:26:04
lights up now I'm so busy with other versions of Little P purpose I just don't have time but if I was really
00:26:09
looking to build a life of purpose around something baseball cards would be a great purpose anchor for me so regret
00:26:15
is one the joys of childhood another one I like to look at is work a lot of people don't enjoy the work but there is
00:26:21
a little piece of work they do like maybe it lasts for an hour every week find those things in work you like even
00:26:27
if you don't love your job and start thinking about those as purpose anchors
00:26:31
I got tired of being a doctor but I loved hospice work and I was doing it for about 10 hours a week but that
00:26:36
became a major purpose anchor for me and last but not least an easy thing to do is if nothing else Works use the
00:26:42
spaghetti method throw a bunch of things against the wall see what sticks that means trying things you don't normally
00:26:47
do hanging out with people you don't normally hang out with maybe doing something that makes you feel slightly
00:26:52
uncomfortable and if it's a day well spent that might be the beginning of a purpose anchor for you so there's
00:26:58
abundance here a million things and every time I coach people on purpose and I go through the pro process of finding
00:27:05
purpose anchors we usually find about 15 or 20 and then I get the exact opposite
00:27:09
question I don't have nearly enough time to do all this and then I say take a
00:27:12
dart and throw it up against a dartboard and whatever two or three things you hit
00:27:16
upon decide that those are going to be your purpose anchors it's not about what
00:27:20
your purpose anchor is it's about the life of purpose you build and create around those ideas you're reminding me
00:27:26
of uh a fairly well-known Charlie Munger quote I might not get the quote exactly
00:27:30
right but one thing he says is the key to happiness is low expectations that that's paraphrase is Charlie Munger
00:27:37
quote is that lined up with what you're thinking here and especially when I think of some of the big p purpose which
00:27:43
we want to avoid it sounds like some of that is as a society maybe just as humans I don't know you know just the
00:27:51
the human brain with us we're Strivers but especially when you put us inside of
00:27:55
the society that you and I live in it's a society where yeah there are expectations laid upon us to do great
00:28:00
things and to change the world and it's it's just kind of removing some of those
00:28:04
high expectations a net positive for our lives so here's what I like to say you're saying high expectations but what
00:28:11
we're really saying is impact in Legacy so when people say I don't want to give
00:28:15
up big p purpose because that's how I change the world what they're really
00:28:18
saying is big p purpose is associated with impacting Legacy and Little P purpose isn't and that's why I have all
00:28:23
these big audacious goals here's my answer and the best answer I can give to
00:28:27
you is in the the form of a story so I like to talk about my maternal grandfather my maternal grandfather died
00:28:33
in the 1960s 10 years before I was born my maternal grandfather loved math it was his little p purpose he didn't want
00:28:40
to solve the world with it he just loved it so what did he do he became a CPA now
00:28:45
back in the 1950s when my mom was a little girl she used to sit on his lap and he would take out his all of his
00:28:51
charts right cuz they didn't have computers and you know electronic spreadsheets at that point they had pen
00:28:56
and paper so we'd have all the little and he showed her the numbers he would
00:28:59
put in each of the little boxes and he loved it and so she saw him doing this thing that he loved this little be
00:29:05
purpose that Lit him up and as most kids do she decided to try on that identity do I love math would I like to be a CPA
00:29:12
the answer ended up being yes and she became a CPA too when I was a little kid I had a learning disability and I
00:29:20
couldn't read while all my classmates were in their beginning readers I was coloring with crayon in a coloring book
00:29:27
I would have thought that I was lost that I just wasn't smart enough but you
00:29:31
see I had taken on my mom's identity I love math too and in fact my math scores
00:29:35
were among the highest and so I knew that even though I couldn't read it wasn't that I was dumb it was that I
00:29:41
needed more help and that gave me the confidence to eventually get over my learning disability I went into medicine
00:29:46
a highly mathematical field and one day when I was a new doctor I was Runing at the hospital and this guy kept on
00:29:52
getting him M of the hospital on death's doorstep dehydrated and I noticed the
00:29:56
mathematical connection between two of his lab results and we diagnosed him with a very rare disease we put him on
00:30:01
the right medicine and he got better and he was a pastor at a local church and he
00:30:06
took in homeless kids and fed them and got them social services and helped them find jobs so let's think about this one
00:30:13
guy practic practicing his little PE purpose in the 1950s changed the world such that 60
00:30:21
years later and hundreds and hundreds of miles away some kid was getting supported after he ran away from an
00:30:28
abusive home that's Legacy that's impact like a stone Dropped In The Water my
00:30:34
maternal grandfather displaced just a little bit of water and that became a wave and at times that wave came
00:30:41
together with other waves to be big and mighty and massive and at other times it
00:30:44
dissipated to just a small little wave but 60 years later it's still coming up
00:30:48
on various Shores throughout the world and touching people's lives Little P purpose changes the world and so I think
00:30:58
it's a moot discussion it's not that I either do big p and have impact or do
00:31:02
little p and don't have impact I think Little P purpose actually in many ways
00:31:06
changes the world more you're reminding me of of something I wrote I'm trying to
00:31:10
remember the title Jordan because I I wasn't anticipating thinking about this
00:31:13
during this interview I'll find it I'll throw the link in the show notes I might
00:31:16
even make it my monologue before this conversation so for those listening it might feel like I'm I'm speaking
00:31:21
backwards in time here but the gist of this article I think I called it impact Theory or something like that but the
00:31:26
whole idea is I just noticed it's so funny how as you interact with the world
00:31:31
you never know what the impact of your interactions with people might be and you never know you know 90% of these
00:31:39
interactions especially like mundane basic interactions that Ripple to use your metaphor is going to dissipate and
00:31:46
pretty much nothing's going to come of it but there are other times where that
00:31:49
Ripple is going to be so consequential for generations to come or you'll you'll
00:31:54
meet someone who gets you your dream career you'll meet someone who introduces you to your spouse and now
00:31:59
you're having kids and you can kind of connect these dots backwards and say if
00:32:02
I had never done X then the world as I know it would be completely different so here's the thing they call that another
00:32:10
term for that is the butterfly effect MH when you do things that deeply light you
00:32:15
up little p purpose that really get you excited you attract people to you like a
00:32:21
moth to the flame they see you lit up and they want to interact with you and you become collaborators if they have
00:32:26
something to teach you they want to teach you if they have something to learn from you they want to become your
00:32:29
student they want to become mentor and mentee so if you want to move the needle towards that impact dying out versus
00:32:37
growing and affecting the world for longer and long longer periods of time deeply engage in things you love and you
00:32:44
will impact people more around you we all know there's this thing called generational trauma and the financial
00:32:52
world we talk about money scripts we talk about our parents end up with money trauma and they de velop these bad money
00:32:58
scripts like money is bad so I have to spend it the moment I get it and they pass that on to their kids and their
00:33:04
kids then believe money is bad they have to spend it the moment they get it and they keep passing that on we talk about
00:33:09
generational trauma all the time we don't talk about generational growth the
00:33:13
exact opposite when you deeply engage in things that are meaningful to you and it
00:33:17
lights you up we also pass on those things to our kids and our family and our friends and they carry those with
00:33:25
them and keep passing them on so again if if we want to move the needle towards impactful versus dissipation do things
00:33:32
deeply important to you and the likelihood is that those waves will travel much much farther I I want to
00:33:38
Circle back to the idea of Legacy or maybe not Circle back I suppose it's all
00:33:42
we've been talking about here for the last few minutes in question and answer
00:33:44
but you know that word legacy sticks out in my mind and maybe it has a different
00:33:49
definition to different people what I think about myself it's like to some extent I I do want people to recognize
00:33:56
that I've led a life well lived I do want people to say you know what Jesse added something to my world and
00:34:01
I'm glad about that but I don't think I care after I die if strangers essentially out there are saying like
00:34:08
wow I'm still reading or listening to the words of Jesse Kramer that's just my
00:34:12
personal thoughts on Legacy but what has your research found when it comes to how
00:34:17
our listeners today can or should or maybe should not think about or consider their own legacy we have a finite time
00:34:25
on this Earth and so our ability to change people connect with people touch people's lives feels very finite so
00:34:34
here's the thing with generational growth and the impact in Legacy I'm talking about I'd like to leave you with
00:34:39
this idea that your goodness what you create and those things you put in the world Outlast you they Outlast you far
00:34:47
past the time where anyone is saying your name or reading about you in the textbooks my maternal grandfather has
00:34:54
been dead since the 1960s his name is Morris Adler probably no one said his name this year and yet his impact lives
00:35:02
on a piece of him and what he loved and what he thought was important is still shaping the world today what else could
00:35:10
we ask for it's the closest we get to immortality it's this idea that we
00:35:16
weren't just a drop in the ocean that disappears but that we actually do displace some of that water and that
00:35:22
displacement continues long after we're gone that to me is Legacy it's that
00:35:28
piece ofie of us that's and purpose for us stays in the universe and still has
00:35:36
effect and I think that's magical I've got a follow on question but it's a hard
00:35:41
question and I I don't know if there's an answer to it maybe maybe you do
00:35:44
Jordan and the question is if your maternal grandfather Morris Adler how aware he was of this when he was living
00:35:52
now obviously he couldn't be aware of what 50 years in the future could be but
00:35:56
you know maybe somewhere in the back of him mind he knew that he was sharing his
00:36:00
enthusiasm and his love of numbers with your mother his daughter and maybe he knew that you know what that's got to
00:36:06
have a positive effect in some way and I guess the the real question and I think
00:36:09
about the actionable thoughts as we can take away from this conversation is is there anything that we can do in our
00:36:14
lives to just be more aware of the fact that we are doing positive things we are
00:36:19
having positive impacts we are striving to be a positive role model for someone and you know what it's certainly not
00:36:26
going to have a negative long-term effect and it all it can do is have posi positive ripples into the future here's
00:36:32
the great thing it's a happy side effect don't even go for legacy don't go for
00:36:37
impact just do things that light you up follow your little PE purpose look at the calendar of your life all the days
00:36:46
weeks months and years and start taking an accounting of how much of that time is filled up with things you love and
00:36:53
how much of that time is filled with things you loathe and every month I want you to look at that calendar and work on
00:37:00
creating more things you love and get getting rid of more things you loathe practice more Little P purpose because
00:37:07
we have no control over time we can't buy it we can't sell it we can't
00:37:10
exchange it it passes no matter what we do the only thing you can do is take an accounting of what activities that fill
00:37:17
that time that you're involved in don't worry about impact don't worry about
00:37:21
Legacy do things that let you up and I promise all of that will happen anyway it did with my maternal grandfather it
00:37:28
was never his plan it can happen for you too well Jordan I think the listeners are going to be able to just feel the
00:37:35
little PE purpose in your life coming through the headphones their headphones today and uh if not they're going to be
00:37:40
able to see it for themselves when the purpose code hits bookshelves and now once listeners are hearing this where
00:37:47
can they go get a copy of the purpose code and and what are some of the things that they can really look forward to
00:37:50
taking away so basically you can go to Jordan grommet.com j o r dgme.com there you can get links to both
00:37:58
my books taking stock in the purpose code as well as where I create content on the web the most common place the Ern
00:38:05
invest podcast but there's the purpose code substack as well as links to my old
00:38:10
financial and medical blogs and what you should expect from this book is an actual version of purpose that you can
00:38:18
touch and feel and use and manipulate we're not talking about Pie in the Sky
00:38:23
Theory when you're done with the purpose code you should have a distinct plan for
00:38:27
how you can build more purpose into your life it is straightforward it is abundant and it is something we can all
00:38:33
strive for that sounds simply amazing doc G Jordan grummet thank you so much for joining us here on the best interest
00:38:40
podcast thank you for having me on the show thanks for tuning in to this episode of the best interest podcast if
00:38:47
you have a question for Jesse to answer on a future episode send him an email at
00:38:52
Jesse bestter interest. blog again that's Jesse bestest . blog did you enjoy the show subscribe rate and review
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00:39:08
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00:39:17
personal podcast met for education and entertainment it should not be taken as Financial advice and is not prescriptive
00:39:24
of your financial situation