444 | Spending for Happiness | Carl Jensen & Doug Cunnington

24:44No, of course it's not. It's not at all. But yet I limited myself in that manner. And I wonder where else I did something similar. That's the most vivid because it's so visceral of like literally seeing a menu, right, guys, and like just throwing out the bottom third of it. But nevertheless, it was real. And I think another thing, like you guys are talking about eating at home, just almost by definition, eating at home is going to be dramatically less expensive than going out. So therefore, maybe you can loosen the purse strings a little bit. And we've both my wife and I have really focused on our health and fitness over the last number of years, but it's been accelerating more in the last year or two.

25:23And now we're much more cognizant of the ingredients and the type of meat and beef that we're bringing into the house and a lot more just grass fed beef and such. And I know when we go to Costco, they have these amazing like multi pound packages of grass fed beef. And I just use that now as like I'll open it up and just have that for a bunch of meals. I eat kind of weird meals sometimes. So I'll have that for for a lunch and a dinner a couple of days in a row. and it's just great. It's there. Yeah. Is it a couple of dollars more per pound than it would be to eat the ground beef from Food Lion or Publix?

26:01Yeah, it is. But I believe that it's better for me. And also just there's something about the convenience factor of having it there, which is great too. So I think there's a lot in there, right? Conveniences is yet another thing that I think we're all probably spending more money on as well. And I want to jump in and go back to just the dollar amounts, even with your example for the grass-fed beef. It reminds me of chatting with Brandon, Matt, scientist. It was a while back when we had him on the show, but we talked about how we treat$10 or$20 right now while we're all in our forties. We treat it the same as when we were in debt in college and we're like, oh,$20, like that's a lot.

26:43Probably need to take care of that a little better. But when you look at our net worth now versus what it was, that threshold should be way higher, a couple hundred bucks. We wouldn't treat it the same, but we treat$7 the same as we did when we were kids, when we were 20. And it's really hard to switch gears and treat it a little bit differently. I mean, I still have a tough time, even though we're talking about spending a little bit more money. What's your threshold, Carl, where you're like, oh, this is a lot of money or this is not? Yeah, I would say it's the same thing. I still think about stupid little purchases and why it's a waste of your brainpower.

27:20You only have so much mental bandwidth, especially me. It's probably really minimal to think about stuff during the day. Why waste your time and money comparing prices of the ounces of cheese in the grocery store? But I still do that sometimes. Now, other times I'll just go crazy and buy the Tullamok because that's really good. But yeah, it's silly. Even bigger expenses. Because I remember I wanted to see the gorillas at Red Rocks, the show, and it sold out instantly and tickets were like 75 bucks. And then I went online and all the resellers were selling them for like$200, which was still cheap, but I didn't pull the trigger.

27:52And now I look back, I'm like, you idiot. You could have seen this great band for 200 bucks, but I was anchored on the$70. And maybe that's part of the problem, Doug. Maybe we're anchored in a place that we shouldn't be anchored at. Maybe we need to learn how to pull up those anchors and throw them out the window or into the sea or whatever. Yeah, I think that's important. And Doug, you're right. On a percentage basis, I think we need to somehow update that. And yeah, I've heard Brandon mention that as well, where you're still stuck in that mindset of when you were 22 or 25. And that's not to say, obviously, that people who are 22 and 25 aren't intelligent adults who know what they're doing.

28:29but like we've updated our thinking over then. And we've also, obviously our net worths have grown dramatically and a hundred dollar expense is not the same percentage of our net worth at 25 as it is at 40 or 50 or 35, whatever the number is. So I think there's some threshold that you need to really think about because otherwise you can get stuck in that and you can get stuck in the every penny. Or for me, the one that always, it really bothers me is like the price of gas. If you ask me, what's my biggest pet peeve in the world? It's people obsessing over the price of gas. I remember going to Belize and we had this amazing tour guide.

29:06And the very first question when he said, oh, what do you want to know about Belize? Some dopey American asked, what's the price of gas? I'm like, are you kidding me? Who cares? This is such a penny wise pound foolish idiocy. And somebody who will drive around to save five cents or 10 cents a gallon, but drive 15 minutes out of their way, which is miles of gas that they're wasting. And more importantly, time. Guys, our time is so finite. People are constantly talking about how busy they are, but yet we fritter away time. And I think conveniences, I mentioned a couple of minutes ago, Carl, this is something that I'm definitely thinking about.

29:43I'm curious, do you think about, I know you're a DIY guy and that's, Doug, I suspect you are as well, but I know precisely that Carl is and just how much he is. And are you okay outsourcing things now? Because I suspect there was a time where you wouldn't have been. I am, but it's a very recent phenomenon. I've got a good friend who I've hired for a bunch of jobs when I can get them. Part of the issue I have with outsourcing it is it isn't so much the money, it's finding someone who will do quality work and actually show up and return phone calls and have communication skills, which could sometimes be difficult to find depending on the job.

30:16But I am now, but it's been a difficult thing to come to. And maybe I'm too much of a control freak. I think the problem is all with me. But yeah, Brad, I've learned to let go, but it's recent. Are there any conveniences that you guys are spending on? So Carl, it sounds like you're in the early stage of this. But Doug, is this something that's crossed your mind in terms of, okay, I'm willing to pay for X, Y, or Z that maybe I wasn't okay with spending on? years ago. I need to think of a few additional examples, but I know just anything where I can save a little bit of time or negativity, like inconvenience for me.

30:58So around here, there's a toll road that goes to the airport and there's hardly any traffic on it. So it's a much more pleasant drive than driving through the city. And I think it costs like 12 or 14 bucks round trip. So it's not cheap to take that road for a 45-minute one-way drive, but I will take it every time because traffic really brings me down. I get that road rage, but I'm not happy out there. I'm not happy, especially in stop-and-go traffic. And I will always take the toll road. So anything where I can avoid something that's negative psychologically for me, I will do it. the other thing is in the past, maybe I would have not taken an Uber or something like that.

31:48And I would have tried to take like public transportation or some cheaper option, but that convenience is awesome. You know, you don't have to wait around so much. You can get a ride right away. Usually it's a little cleaner than like a cab or a bus. So things like that, anything where I could save like a few minutes, even if it's a lot more expensive than what I would have spent a few years ago. And on that, I have one question for you, Brad. And if you answer no to this, and this is something I've recently come to, which Brad, I'm telling you, I was living life completely wrong. So I hope you have the right answer to this.

32:21Do you have TSA pre-check or global entry? Oh, you bet I do. Oh, I didn't sign up for that until recently. And then I signed up and I was so stupid because I'd be at the airport with Doug and he's through security like 15 minutes before me or our friend Chris. And I still was resistant to it. And finally I pushed myself over the edge. Okay, good, good. We can continue. No, that is an amazing thing. And yeah, we've talked about TSA Pre a couple of times recently with Ginger on some of the Roundup episodes that I've done. So yeah, if you're listening to this and you don't have TSA PreCheck or global entry, you really, really, really should look into it.

32:54A lot of credit cards offer that as a free benefit. So you can use that credit card to pay for your fee. And it's generally somewhere in the vicinity of$100 for five-year membership. So even if you had to pay for this thing, it's well worth$20 a year, but you can often with many cars, you can just Google this really easily. Just get that enrollment fee waived. Essentially, they'll just refund it back to your account. And yeah, that is something it's huge. I mean, Carl, I saved I think coming back from the Bahamas, we saved about 90 minutes with global entry back in the US. It was remarkable. We were through customs in under a minute just from having global entry.

33:32It was awesome. And even if you're not an international traveler, TSA pre-check is just critical. And it just feels good, right? Like it feels nice to zip through the line. So yeah, I'm with you on that. Yeah, it's interesting. Doug, you mentioned like a couple of things about maybe parking or an Uber or taking a more expensive route and not worrying about the whatever X number of dollars, 10,$12, because it's gonna save me a lot of time. And as part of this Bono trip that I took, this was like a mental experiment for me, guys. So I actually had this thought, how could I act like a rich person for this 24 hours?

34:07And this was in my very low key way. And it sounds so silly, but like I have never, the Richmond airport is virtually empty and they have economy parking. It's like six or$7 a day. And it's amazing when you park, the shuttle is like right there, like following you to your spot because there's nobody there and they just zip you back over to the terminal. It's great. But then I noticed, Oh, there's this, there's this daily parking lot that's right next to the terminal where you don't need the shuttle, which yeah, even though it's great, it takes 10 or 15 minutes. It was like$2 extra a day or something like that,$2 to$4 extra a day.

34:39I'm like, I'm doing this for a 24-hour period. What would it feel like to just park in that lot for the first time in my life? And I know it's so silly and it sounds pathetic that I'm hemming and hawing over$4, but it's just something like I'm not the type of person who does that because it's so easy to park in economy. I don't need that. I don't need the convenience. But you know what, guys? It felt fantastic to park in that lot, to just walk directly to the gate. And when I got off the flight the next day and came back home, I just walked straight to my car and it was great. And it cost me, yeah, probably$4 extra.

35:10It was so silly, but it just, it made a difference. Or when I was in New York City, flying into New York has, I'm from Long Island, so I can say this affectionately, like terrible, terrible ways to get from the airport to Manhattan. And if you're flying into JFK, at least there's the air train and you can kind of get there. But LaGuardia has always been terrible. but now they added some, I don't know, LaGuardia link or something. And you have to take a bus to the subway. And it sounded like a big hassle. I was like, oh, yeah, that wouldn't be that bad. But should I do that? Should I take an Uber?

35:40And it was like, all right, this is 24 hours of being a rich person. I'm just going to take an Uber. And it was expensive. It was like 60 or$70. But you know what? It wasn't a big pain in the butt to do this bus to the subway. And I just did it. And that saved me a good bit of time. And you know what? I actually got to see Paula Pant and Barbara Sloan in New York City and hang out with them that if I'd wasted that hour or two, I wouldn't have been able to. And that was well worth any amount of money that I spent actually. So the reason why we're giving all these examples is not because I want someone to emulate this exact thing, nor your guys' examples, but it's so you, the listener, are hearing this and trying to think of ways in your life where, oh, how can I build this in?

36:22How can I think of little things that I can maybe spend a little bit extra on, but that are going to dramatically increase my happiness or save myself time or make my life easier, right? Guys, this is what we're trying to do here. And I think we could all probably sit here and regale people with stories of this, but it might be something to think about. Look for pain points in your life. And I'm curious, since you guys asked me, like, are there pain points in your life now that you've identified that you'd like to potentially spend on, but that you haven't pulled the trigger or you just can't bring yourself, but you'd like to.

36:55Yeah, I'll go first on that one. We have a, the car I drove over here is a 2010 Mazda 5, which has been great. It's got 206 ,000 miles on it, but it got pelted by hail, which I don't really care about that. It's ugly. It's rusting, but it now has a leak. So you go in there and it smells like mildew. It smells horrible. And the air conditioning quit working, which is, it might be a deal breaker. The Mazda 5 might need to find a new home. So I should just spend the money and get a car with that. Everything works that doesn't stink. But yeah, I can't really think of any other pain points, Brad. Life is good.

37:27Okay. Wow. Doug, anything jump to mind? I've been strategically eliminating these things for a few years, so I'm in a pretty good spot. However, one thing that I did recently, kind of a convenience plus travel, was a vacation that we took to San Diego. And we stayed in the Mission Beach area, which is pretty nice, cool boardwalk, like right on the beach. There's a lot of places you can stay. There's many, many options. But I was like, I want to just walk outside and be on the beach. I don't want to have to drive a quarter mile and try to find parking or walk across the busy street. I just want to be right there.

38:08So that's one thing where definitely in the past, I would have opted for something a little bit cheaper. And I would justify it in various ways like, oh, we could eat more food out, We can get more beer out or whatever, but it was a great decision to just get the place we wanted at the spot we wanted and not compromise on that. And, you know, we had an Airbnb so we can cook inside again. Some of the frugality stuff still sneaks through, but like the biggest thing was being right where we wanted to be. And on that vacation, I decided we're not going to rent a car. That would be more headache. Apparently I really don't like driving around in traffic.

38:47So I was like, that would be more of a headache. There's a theme here. And let's take an Uber if we have to go anywhere and it'll be fine. And in the long run, it's actually probably cheaper to get an Uber unless you're like driving all over the place, which we were not because we got the cool place that we were right on the beach. So we didn't need to go anywhere. Yeah, that is huge. And I think that's one of the things we've also hit on is finding the precise micro location when we're on vacation, because we unfortunately just the season of life we're in now, the girls are busy with school. they're busy during the summer we're just not traveling as much as we used to so when we are able to travel it's really important to maximize that and and i think about something like we love a little beach town called algonquet in maine and laura and i've been there a couple times and it's just one of our favorite places on earth and the difference between being a mile out of town at maybe and i haven't even looked it up but like maybe a chain where i could use hotel points or things like that and get it for free versus having the exact hotel that we've stayed in now three times and the exact perfect location that's right by the beach, right by town and not having to deal with the traffic because there actually is a decent bit of traffic, but it's totally irrelevant and immaterial when you're exactly where we are.

40:04That's worth every dollar because we love that town, but we actually had friends who stayed in that mile outside of town and their experience on that vacation was dramatically different than ours. It was dramatically worse. So that kind of thing, or just being in, again, a very precise walk. Like we're now optimizing for walkability when we go on vacation. So you go to London and we wanted to stay in a very specific small little town where we could walk to the tube stop or we could walk to the high road. And those kinds of things are just, they're critical for me now. And, you know, Doug, you mentioned, uh, frugality sneaks through.

40:41I know you're saying that jokingly, but I think this is not, and I hope nobody's taking away from this conversation that the three of us are not frugal people anymore, that we're not people who save money, that we're not optimizing. We're optimizing in different ways. And yeah, I think what's in there is a little kind of tacit admission that maybe, maybe, and not to put words in your guys' mouth, but that we were a little over the line of frugality at some point. And again, I don't want to sound like I'm a broken record here, but the frugality is important. We're not trying to say it's not like it's so important for people finding FI.

41:14And I know that's what's hard about a podcast like this is we're speaking to a broad swath of the FI community. And it's very hard to meet everybody in one episode, obviously. And you can't do that. But I just want to make it clear that we're not saying go out and blow all your money or being frugal isn't important or being mindful isn't important. being a valueist isn't important. We're not saying that at all, but you can over-optimize to your detriment. I think that is the most succinct way that I would want to put it. And you don't want to over-optimize to your detriment. And yeah, I mean, I think, Doug, part of life is making choices.

41:49And if you can make a choice to, okay, like you said, you like cooking. If we're going to maybe eat in when we go on vacation and get amazing ingredients, maybe you're up in Maine and you get lobster or something like that would be awesome. And that isn't like a frugality sneaking through. That's a, hey, this is another way of experiencing something. And maybe that then enables us because again, money is finite, no matter how much you have, that enables us to spend a little more on the exact micro location we want to be like that to me sounds like a fantastic way to think through a financial life.

42:22So Brad, I have a question for you about die with zero Bill Perkins, which you've mentioned like a thousand times enough, Brad, that you actually got me to read it. Because I heard about it for a long time and I thought, I get the point, no need. But finally, I did check it out. So this is a tough question for you. But what are a couple ideas from Die With Zero that triggered you? Because I mean, you already had some of the thoughts that we were talking about where, hey, you could spend a little more on your priorities. Certain conveniences are great. But what was it? Because that book's not too old.

42:54What triggered you from the book to really change your mindset a little bit? And then, you know, so much inspiration that you're telling a bunch of other people on your podcast to get us to read it too. Well, I'm glad you read it. I hope you enjoyed it. I think to me, the biggest trigger was just very simply my kids. And it was, and this is obviously not the textual reading of it, but it was realizing that time is finite and that, okay, my older daughter is now 15. My younger one is 11. and there is a real chance that in three years, my older daughter goes off to college and who knows how much more we'll see her.

43:35I mean, I think there's a reasonable chance that we will, but I mean, you think about how many people go off to college, stay where they are for the summer and then go live somewhere else. And in which case when she hits 18, that essentially is 95 plus percent of the time that I'll ever spend with her. And I know I've talked about the article, called The Tail End by Tim Urban on Wait But Why. And that's where a lot of that came from. But there was just something about how Bill Perkins put his message in Die With Zero that just made me realize just how finite life is. And that was kind of the lightning bolt of you think of yourself, like I still think of myself as a pretty young guy, but yet you just you just have to do the math, right?

44:18Like, okay, 44 years old. If I'm still healthy at 84, you know, I I'm on a pretty good trajectory, but what is healthy at 84 for me look like? I don't know. So maybe, maybe I've got 40 years, maybe it's 30 of real, real health span. Okay. So that's 30 years. That's 30 more summers. That's how many more trips. That's how many more times am I going to go to the beach. That's how many more times am I going to travel to X anywhere? Oh, Gunkwood. I've mentioned, right? Like we've been there three or four times. How many more times realistically am I going to go to a Gunkwood in my life? Could be zero, could be one.

44:56You never know when something is the last time. That was another thing that jumped out to me is you just never know sometimes when it's the last time, but maybe being more mindful of, Hey, this could be the last time. Like, I think he talked about like wakeboarding or something like that. And it was like, all right, look, you know, just based on where I am in my life, I'm not going to do wakeboarding after I'm 50. So this is literally the last time. And he said it to himself in the moment. And I think in a weird way that allows you more enjoyment of the experience. And it has definitely changed my way of thinking in terms of how I relate to my kids and how I think about the time we have.

45:31And I've mentioned a couple of times here on the show that I was thinking about going to Taylor Swift with my older daughter and we pulled the trigger. And actually, when we're recording this, I'm getting ready to drive to Pittsburgh here in about one hour, maybe right after we hit stop. And we're going to see Taylor tomorrow. You know, I bought the tickets. We've been looking forward to it now for a couple of weeks. And I think like as Bill Perkins said, another thing, Doug, that jumped out to me was the memory dividends. That's a phrase he used, which is we can talk about and think about this shared experience forever now.

46:04And I mean, there's a high likelihood this will be the best concert either of us ever go to in our entire lives. And I mean, I've been to see Pearl Jam. I've seen Billy Joel a bunch of times. Like I saw that Bono thing, like Dave Matthews band when he was getting started. Like I've seen a lot of good concerts and there's a reasonable likelihood this is going to be the best one. And especially that I'm going with Anna. And now it's like, oh, okay, well, Molly, my younger one, isn't going on this trip. We're going to take a trip together to New York city in August. That was like my, Hey, this is the special thing we're going to do.

46:31I wouldn't have done either of those things before I read that I was zero. I just simply wouldn't have. And that's the way, and Doug, obviously I could keep going on and on here, but nobody wants to hear me yap for 30 minutes straight. But those are the kind of lighting bolts that I've had from reading that book. I love it, man. What's your favorite Taylor Swift song? Oh, well, there's so many. I think the song All Too Well is probably my favorite and might be the best song ever written. It's just a brilliant, beautiful song. the 10 minute version I would highly recommend. Yeah. That's probably my favorite one.

47:03She is an amazing songwriter. Like it's just truly remarkable. Carl and I are newer to Taylor Swift, but we're really trying. Yeah. My, uh, so my older daughter got a ticket. My younger one did not, but wants to go. I don't think she's really a true fan. She just sees all the hype around it and wants to go. So I've been debating whether or not to pull the trigger, but I don't know. I might do it. Yeah. Doug, you want to go with us? Yeah, I guess so. I guess if I'm talking like that, I guess I've got to go too. All right. You're getting the tickets. You Swifties. All right, guys, I know you both read Diamond Zero, but Doug, since you were the one who asked me, I'm going to turn around immediately on you and put you on the hot seat.

47:37So what were the takeaways for you or were there any lighting bolt moments? The biggest thing was sort of time bucketing your life. And there's certain things that we are capable of doing and really enjoying now in our forties that if we tried to do it in our sixties, it may not be very fun or we may not want to do it at all or 70s or whatever. So that could be, you know, summiting a mountain, right? It could be really, really fun in the next, say, like 10 or 15 years. Knock on wood, we'll all be healthy enough and in shape to do something like that. But we have this limited time and you have to, you know, don't forget, it's really easy to be complacent.

48:18I mean, I spent a lot of my 20s and 30s like drinking way too much, which I'm probably going to pay for in the future. And if I would have been a little bit smarter about it, I would have done a few more things at the right timeframe. Bill gives examples in his book where in your 20s, maybe you'll stay in hostels or less than ideal lodging situations. But now we're old. We're old guys and we want a little bit more comfort. Maybe we don't want to share. I mean, I love rooming with Carl at conferences, but sometimes maybe we want to have our own room, just have a little more space so he doesn't have to listen to me snore, for example.

48:57But little things like that where as time goes on, maybe we won't want to do those things or we physically won't be able to. So that was huge. And I'm trying to think about that and strategically think about five or 10-year increments and looking at people who are older than us and how in shape are they? Like, what can they do? Am I going to be able to be in that good of shape when I'm that old? Do I have that kind of discipline? And I don't know if I do. So time buckets. Yeah, time books. That's really important. And yeah, it's funny. Another person that I constantly reference is Dr. Peter Atiyah.

49:35And his book Outlive came out recently. And it's very, very dense. But for people who don't follow Atiyah, I would highly recommend that book. he talks about the centenarian Olympics and basically how he conceptualizes that is, okay, what are the 10 things I want to do as a healthy 90-year-old in essence? So pick up a grandkid or great-grandkid as they run to you from across the room. All right, well, that takes a lot of skill if you really think about it. You have to stabilize, you have to squat down, you have to pick them back up or putting a bag in an overhead compartment as opposed to needing somebody else to help you.

50:11So, okay, at 90, that's what I want to do. But what do I need to do today? Because if let's say that kid weighs 20 pounds, if you can only front squat with like a kettlebell 20 pounds today at 40, well, there's a 0 % chance you can do that at 90 then because your body is going to break down. There's just very simple, just the math of it. So you probably need to be able to do a 50 pound goblet squat or a 70 pound, something like that, right? And work backwards and realize, okay, there's going to be some loss. that doesn't mean it's going to be catastrophic, but I need to think about that. Again, it's a mental framework for how do I think about what do I want my life to look like?

50:48What do I want to be able to do? Walk around a city that I go visit. I'd love to be able to do that at 80. I think that's perfectly possible. I see no reason why I can't, but if I sat around from 44 until 80, there's no chance, 0%. So yeah, I think that's important to think about. And Carl, I know you read Die With Zero also and had a big takeaway. I'd love to hear about that as well. Yeah, a die with zero is great. I'm pretty stuck in my way, so it's rare I read something that changes a strongly held thought I had. But what Bill mentions in the book is most people wait till they die to give their money away to their kids or to charities or whatever.

51:20So if you're 80 and you die, your kids are probably in their 50s, let's say, that money isn't going to have the effect on their life that it could if you gave it to them at a younger age. And I'm not saying paying for college, which I'll probably do. I'm talking about, Bill mentions this in his book, perhaps helping them when they're in their early 30s, when they've got a good head on their shoulders, they've probably met a good partner by that time. If you could do something like buy them a house or give them a significant amount of money at that age, you're probably going to change their lives and it's not going to have nearly the same effect as if you do that when you die.

51:54So that's one thought. And the other one I think about is, why wait till you die to give your money away? And to be clear, I don't want my name on anything. I'll probably give a bunch of money to our library. But how cool would it be to see that money in action when I'm still alive versus the thought of knowing it's going to go to them after I croak? But I'm not going to be able to see any of that. So if things keep going well for us, I look forward to perhaps, I don't want to dial a zero. That's too close to the line for me. but giving most of it away and seeing my money in action to my family and to causes I care about before I buy the farm.

52:31Yeah, I love that. And I agree. And I don't think most people in our orbit would want to give money away just to get their stupid name on a building. That just seems like such a colossal waste to me. But yeah, is there value you can add to the world with that money? And like you're saying with your kids, and I think, and this might be a longer separate conversation, but your entire thought process. I know over the years you've hinted about, not hinted necessarily as much as questioned, hey, do I give my kids anything? Do I pay for college? Like I know you and Mindy have thought about what is this going to do to them?

53:04And I think it sounds as if your thinking has been updated in that just saying like, hey, we're probably going to pay for college or we're thinking about giving them money at an earlier age. I think there was a time where you were thinking about like, they're just not going to get money. They're going to have to be self-made on some level. Is my recollection right? Yeah, that's absolutely true. My thought was that my kids should have to go through the same trials and tribulations that I had. And that is take out a bunch of loans and put themselves through school because I thought like me, that might help them make a better decision about what they wanted to study.

53:39I was very deliberate because I knew I'd have to pay for it myself. So I thought that I had to put my children through the same thing. And I don't think you have to do that. I still want them to be thoughtful about it and not study something ridiculous. And I might still put some rules around it. But like one thought I've had, Brad, is maybe I'll just give them an equivalent amount of money of what it would cost to go to school and they can do, I don't want to say whatever they want with it, but I don't think school is a slam dunk. Maybe they want to start a business or try to be an entrepreneur in some way.

54:10And I'd have to put some more thought into this, put some guardrails around it. But yeah, I have updated my thinking, Brad. And mostly because I don't want them to stress either, especially our older one, Claire. She's like, oh, I'm so worried about the loans I'd have to get. I'm like, no, no, no, Claire. You don't understand. You'll be taken care of one way or the other. Yeah, I like that. I think just, again, the thoughtfulness as opposed to this is our reflexive answer or this is what I've always thought and maybe I haven't updated that thinking in 10 or 20 years. So that's just what we're going to do.

54:43And I think a lot of people do. they just stick their heads in the sand and they don't think about things. And I think that's part of what we in the fight community do best is we try to think through problems. We see the world as it is. And we understand that you have to update your thinking because new information is always rolling in. And part of this that Perkins talked about, and Carl, you mentioned this before is, Hey, okay, probably you're going to live into your nineties. And in which case, then your children are going to be in their sixties, or maybe who knows, who knows where advances take us.

55:12And are your kids really going to get value in getting millions of dollars in their sixties or seventies when a good portion of their life has already gone by? Like that seems like the least optimal way to do it as opposed to, Hey, if you gave them enough money for a down payment for a house when they were 25 and they could house hack and then propel themselves to, okay, this is an asset I have and I can cut my living expenses down to almost zero or Or they can learn how to real estate invest, as you're talking about. I might give them that pot of money you're saying. That, to me, seems so much more optimal than giving them a million dollars when they're 75 and their whole life has gone by.

55:54They either don't need it, which is the most likely circumstance, or if they need it, they could have used it 30 years prior and would have had a dramatically less stressful and better life at that point. So yeah, again, we're not giving prescriptions here. I think that's a massive takeaway. way. It's just like, guys, it's the thought process, right? Like just the fact that we're thinking about this. And if we were sitting around a table five years ago, I don't think we'd be having this conversation. Yeah, I think you're absolutely right, Brad. It's so interesting. I think this is a fun way to live too.

56:25Like you said, Brad, you intercept new information and then you change your thoughts on it. I think that's very, very healthy. Carl, that is the perfect way to end the episode. And I think 99 times out of a hundred, I would end it right there and not try to talk more because that was the perfect stopping point. But I'm one of those people who has to close the loop on something that we talked about before. I always hate those podcasters that like, oh, we're going to talk about this later in the episode and they don't get to it. It's like, no, you had to. I need to close the loop. So I mentioned that, Carl, you had something amazing that you did in your life around music and a concert experience.

57:02I'd love if you could just tell the audience to close out here. Yeah. So I grew up in Chicago and there was this band that got kind of big in Chicago. They were much bigger in the UK and they were called the Webb Brothers. And I got into their music and I really liked it. Probably one of my top three bands of all time. And they're about the same age as me and they kind of faded away for a bit. But then I read, I think it was a Facebook post that they were starting a Kickstarter campaign. And if you don't know what Kickstarter is, that's when someone wants to raise money. And if they raise the amount of money that they need, then everyone gets this prize.

57:32If they don't, then no one gets it. And prize might be, in this case, it was a record and you actually had the opportunity to buy a concert for$10 ,000. And I saw this, I'm like, holy cow. And I'm going to date myself a little bit here, Brad. I thought about Fast Times at Ridgemont Eye. Have you ever seen that movie? Yeah, yeah. Where Spicoli wins money from saving Brooks Shields from drowning and he blows it all and paying Van Halen to play in his backyard. So I'm like, wow, this is my Van Halen moment. I could have one of my favorite bands in the world play in my backyard. They said they would come anywhere.

58:04But then I'm like, no, this is completely ridiculous. There's no way I'm going to do this. I'm not even going to entertain this. But for the heck of it, I tweeted it. And the reason I tweeted it was, thinking back on it now, I was looking for reassurance that not doing this was the right idea. I wanted the FI community to tell me that I was crazy for even considering this thing. And then I think, Brad, you might've been one of the first ones to respond. And you might have been first and said, you should totally do this. The memory dividends will pay off for the rest of your life. And I was taken aback.

58:33I'm like, wow, I have so much respect for Brad. And he's telling me I should do this thing. And then I remember Joel Larsgaard from Haunted Money, another good friend, said, yeah, you should totally do this. I'm like, wow, these people are saying this. So I went to Mindy. I'm like, hey, you know this concert thing? Because I had mentioned it to her offhandedly. I'm like, people are saying I should do this. What do you think? And that was, if she would have said no, I would have not done it. She's like, meh, if you really want to do it, go for it. So I pulled the trigger and here I am, a$10 ,000 concert in Longmont on August 26th.

59:05Open to everyone, but especially friends of the band. So if you're in town, come to Longmont in August. Just come to Longmont and find it. Do people get in touch with you through your website? Yeah, they can send me an email, mr1500 at 1500days.com. But yeah, seriously, if there's any fans of the band. And there have been some that have reached out. Please come and see this. It's going to be awesome. Two sets and it's going to be great. That is so cool. Gentlemen, this was fantastic. I really appreciate it. I feel like we can and should do a part two. I know we had a long outline and we got to about half of it.

59:39So this is the first, I think, of many of these conversations because this, I think, is where a lot of us who have been in the fight community for a while with the phase we're in right now. And I think it's important. I think it's important for the evolution because, again, we've always talked about five is not zero or one. It's not just, hey, I hit that number on the screen and then my life is wonderful. It doesn't work that way. There's a lot of work that goes into building a life that you want to live into. And I think this is part of it, this spending for happiness. And it's an evolution, as we've all talked about here.

1:00:13This is not something where you flip a switch and it's easy because we've built up this skill of spending and maybe, maybe some of that deprivation mindset over many years. And it doesn't just flip. So I think part of this intentionality that we're applying to it is just, it's really important. So thank you both for being here. I know people can reach out to you, milehighfi.com and obviously the mile high five podcast, which is fantastic. Is there anywhere else you want to direct people to? I think that sounds good. What's our email address that I can never remember? It's in the show notes for our shows.

1:00:46So if people go to the show, they could check it out. Any complaints, go to Carl at milehifi.com. Cool. Compliments go to Doug. At milehifi.com. Nice. Sounds like a plan, guys. I really appreciate it. This is a lot of fun. And until next time. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you, Brad. Thank you for listening to today's show and for being part of the Chooseify community. If you haven't already, the best ways to get involved are first, subscribe to the podcast. So you're listening to this on a podcast player and just hit subscribe and then subscribe to my weekly newsletter. I actually sit down every Monday and write this by hand and I send it out Tuesday morning.

1:01:26So just head over to choosefi.com slash subscribe. And it's really, really easy to get on the newsletter list right there. And I would greatly appreciate it. It's the best way to get in touch with me. You can actually just hit reply to any of those emails and it comes directly to my inbox. So that's the way that I keep a pulse of the community and how we keep this the ultimate crowdsourced personal finance show. And finally, if you're looking to join an in real life community, we have choose a FI local groups in 300 plus cities all around the world. So head to choose a FI.com slash local and you'll find a list of all of those cities in 20 plus countries all across the world.

1:02:04And if you're just getting started with FI or you have a family member or friend who you think would be interested, two easy ways. Choose a Vi episode 100 is kind of our welcome to the Phi community. And even though it's a couple years old at this point, it still stands up. And it's a really great just starting point to get an understanding of what is financial independence? What are we doing here? Why are we looking to live a more intentional life where we save money and use it as a springboard to live a better life? And then Choose a Vi created a financial independence 101 course that's entirely free.

1:02:39just head to choosefi.com slash fi101. And again, thanks for listening.