Navigating the Path to FI: Bill Powell's Blue Collar Journey from Debt to Empowerment

0:00Hey, it's Brad. Before we get started with the episode, I wanted to pass along some incredibly exciting news in the Chooseify world. As we talked about on a previous episode, Jonathan has spent the last couple of years building something incredible, and we actually just rolled it out. This is our brand new Chooseify member site. It's obviously entirely free to sign up for. We're hoping this will take the place of our Facebook groups, both for the main Facebook group and especially for our local groups. So how this is going to work, you just go to our main homepage, chooseify.com, and you will see front and center, register, sign up for an account, log in.

0:33it's really, really easy. We made it as simple as possible. So right now, Jonathan is building this in public. Every single day, he posts an update with the 20 or 30 things that he updated from the last day that people reported that, Hey, I want to see this. I'd love to see this new feature. How can we do this? This is the ultimate crowdsource personal finance website and community. We finally built it. We've dreamed of this since 2017. We finally have the technology. We are not beholden to Facebook anymore. We can actually send out events and you will get emailed notification of it. So it's not just the 1%.

1:09If you get lucky that Facebook shows you the notification now for your local groups, when you sign up, you tag, Hey, I'm a member of this local group. And when your admin sets up an event, you will get email notified. So you can't possibly miss it. This is so exciting. We already have thousands upon thousands of people that signed up just in the first three days. and I expect there to be tens of thousands before very long. So I wanted to jot this off before the episode started. Go to choosefi.com, our main homepage, and sign up for an account today. Hello and welcome to ChooseFI. Today on the show, we have a real treat.

1:43We have community member Bill Powell, who's somebody who emails me every single week as an accountability buddy. And he checks in, he has five different aspects of his life that he's trying to improve and work on. And he uses these emails to me as both accountability and as journaling. And I think it's just so incredible. And it highlights how these little 1 % actions every single day, every single week, every single month can add up to something truly extraordinary. And Bill's path is exactly that. He started in the trades with a significant amount of credit card debt and met his wife. They both got on the right path together.

2:21They've paid off their house. They are just years from FI and they're living amazing lives. And that's really at the heart of it. I think a lot of you are going to see yourself in this story and are going to take great motivation from this. And with that, welcome to Choose FI.

2:45Bill, it is so good to have you on the podcast. We have emailed for so long now, and this is a long time coming. Thank you for being here. I am definitely excited. This is a bucket list item for me, for sure. That's so awesome. And yeah, I think one of the best parts of Choose a Vibe for me is really getting to know our community and getting to know the amazing, incredible people that make up our community. And I think that's why I go to a lot of these live events all across the country and world. That's why I say every single week in my newsletter, hit reply. And let me know what's going on. Send me your wins.

3:20Tell me what's going on in your world. And there are a handful of people who email me really regularly. And I feel like they're friends of mine and you are squarely in that handful. So you've done some remarkable things. And I think one of the cool parts that we talked about was you basically said, the more I can share about my life, the more it can help somebody else. And I think this episode is going to help a lot of people. So let's start from where you came from and where you are now, because I think this illustrates really an incredible amount of persistence, growth, learning, connection, just everything that FI and our community stands for, I think is encapsulated in your story.

4:01Not to put too much pressure on you here, Bill, but let's go for it. I'd love for you to share with the community. So just a backstory on me, family was all blue collar. I went through high school, barely graduated with the mindset that I was basically going into construction and that was it. Worked in commercial construction, residential construction, went back to commercial interiors, various aspects of it. And usually in those industries, It's a lot of drinking, it's a lot of partying, stuff like that. And as I've come along this journey, now I'm director of project management for an AV integration company for custom homes.

4:50So just learning along the way that with communication with people, with talking to different individuals and building meaningful relationships, you can do so much more than what everybody else thinks your normal path should be. oh that hits hard what everybody else thinks your normal path should be and yeah i suspect i suspect that happens more often than i even think you know i know a really good friend of mine grew up in a in a farming town and it was just anticipated that pretty much everybody stays in that farming town and and this is the path maybe you farm maybe you work in a factory but But that's the extent.

5:35And I think it's so sadly limiting. But there are those people that break out. And it's fascinating to see that you are one of them. I'd love to hear, how does that unfold? So my dad was a carpenter. And I just looked at it. And like you had said, when you're from a small town and farming is all you do or all you know, that's kind of what you go to. For me, my dad was a carpenter. My mom worked for the post office. I just said, you know what? That's what I'm going to go into. I'm going to go into construction because that's all I knew. So as I kind of got out, you know, the funniest thing was always my exit interview from high school when I was talking to my guidance counselor and they said, okay, what was your ACT score?

6:19And I'm like, it was a zero because I didn't take it. And then they're like, oh, you took the SAT. What was your SAT score? I'm like, zero. I didn't take it. And he kind of looked at me funny and he's like, well, what are you going to do? And I said, I'm going to go into construction. And he looked me square in the eye and said, you can't do that. And I was like, okay, I'm done here. And I just kind of stood up and walked out because like the trades really at that time, they weren't pushing a lot in schools anymore. So it was kind of the, you know, I graduated in 2001. So it was the, you know, that's really when, hey, you got to go to college.

6:53You got to get a degree. You got to do this really was, I feel like taking off. And I'm kind of that personality that if you tell me I can't do something. I'll prove to you that I can do it no matter how painful or, you know, long it takes, that's for sure. So getting out of high school, I got right into, actually before I went into drywall, I was in the, I joined the electrical union and then right as I was in the electrical apprenticeship, 9-11 happened. And then they kind of told me, Hey, you're going to be laid off for the next six months because they didn't know what was going on. And so I couldn't really afford that Went into drywall and metal stud for a couple of years, basically framing out commercial office spaces and things of that nature.

7:40For a few years, went into doing trim for custom homes, base case, making cabinets, doing custom stair rails, learning from a gentleman who was phenomenal to work for. Just took real pride and quality in his work. from there I got sucked into the world of contract office furniture so that's been almost 20 years I was in that realm so installing picture cubicles private offices conference rooms all over the country travel to DC quite often doing quite a bit down there New York California so I got to see a good chunk of the world from that. That's really cool. I'm curious before you get into today.

8:28So blue collar path to fi you and I had emailed about this and I think to our great detriment, like you said, about 20 some odd years ago, there was this college for all and it kind of really looked down upon or vilified even, which might be a stretch, but I don't know if it's that much of a stretch, the trades. And I think that was just, it was such a detriment to so many people, a lot of not exclusively, certainly, but a lot of young men, especially in kind of pigeonholing people into a path that may not have been the right thing for them and kind of assuming that one size fits all and that college is absolutely necessary.

9:05And frankly, I personally think that was a grave mistake for the country as a whole. And it's interesting to see like nowadays with AI and so many jobs potentially getting eliminated, the thing that almost invariably is not going to be eliminated is the trades. I mean, maybe we can make an argument about that, but I'll go to bat for that as of this moment. And I think there are ways to get into it without obviously giving up four years of your life. Clearly there are apprenticeships, but it's not this onerous cost of college. It's not the four years of opportunity cost. To me, there's an allure to that, especially for people who know their personal finance.

9:45Maybe they found shoes to buy early or the simple path to wealth. I'd love for you to talk through the case for the trades or blue collar work on your path to buy. Yeah. One thing I will say about blue collar work is there is good money to be made if you keep focused and really hone your craft. Everybody talks about side hustles. Well, with blue collar work, what you do in the daytime, you can do in the nighttime afterward, right? It's not like you're trying to pivot from one industry to the next. You can go and help a friend on their house or solicit work that way. One thing I will say that is very lacking in the trades is financial literacy.

10:30So you get, even in the union side of it, right? Because union, non-union, that's tomato, tomato for me. But I feel like a lot of people aren't taught that to save money. In the union, it was, hey, you've got a pension. So anything you bring home, you can spend it. Not realizing that, hey, we make a lot of money in the union. If I'm intentional about what I'm spending on and I save in addition to my pension, I can work. I can do that. You can turbocharge so much of your life. But I also think there's a big allure in the trades in general of, hey, let's go out and have a beer after work. And hey, let's go out and do this.

11:11So there's a lot of things that your money can be wasted on too. Yeah, Bill, I hear you about the... It's really double-edged sword ultimately, right? So the pension on the one side, the potentially nice income, solid income, especially for not having to deal with onerous student loan debt and years of your life. But then there is a YOLO culture, from what I've heard. I haven't been in the world, but YOLO culture, there's a truck buying culture. There's a let's go out for multiple drinks culture. And there's an easy way, I think we all know, no matter what you earn, no matter how little debt you start with, there's an easy way for this to be a real slippery slope into something negative.

11:53And yeah, I'd love to hear your thoughts on that generally? Yeah. I mean, I, I, I lived it. I, I would go out drinking, I would spend all my money and, and that was it. I was having a good time and just, you know, I can't take it with me. So I'm going to spend it while I'm here. And, and that's it, you know, thinking at 20 years old, I knew what life would bring and obviously life is the ultimate teacher there. But yeah, I think, there's a lot that can happen in the blue collar field in regards to financial literacy. I think the more that they're exposed to it and stuff like that, they can grow in this area as well.

12:36I try to work with whoever is working for me or working with me to really help them understand things and go through what I've learned just from the podcast and going through our 401k options and talking to the installers that we have here at my new company. Hey, when you're looking at things, look at the expense ratios. What's an expense ratio? The thing that'll make or break your financial future. So just really trying to focus on that because I know when I was there, there was nobody helping us out, right? It was just, hey, here's your paycheck every week. Hopefully you can save enough to make it to next Friday.

13:17Yeah. Goodness. Yeah. I mean, the need for mentoring in every type of job is critical. And I love that you stepped up and done that. For people out there who ideally would love to mentor other people in their job, in their company, in their profession, and maybe you don't think about it as overtly as mentoring, but that's how I'm hearing it, is how do you approach that subject with those younger people? I ask a lot of questions. That was kind of one of my focuses for last year is listening more. And I really try to just figure out where they are on their journey because explaining investment options doesn't help anybody that doesn't even know how to initiate their 401k, right?

13:58So really following up with them, hey, how's everything going? How's life going in general, right? Are you in our 401k program? Just asking them real lose questions about things, not, you know, like he said, what's your net worth? You know, but just trying to get a feel for where people are at genuinely and building genuine relationships to help them move forward. Yeah. I love that. And that's what you talked about earlier. So a couple of themes that I'm picking up, you said, how have you moved forward in your own life and career? It's talking to people, having conversations and connection. And you just said, And this is one of really the five pillars.

14:37And I kind of loosely talked about the emails that you sent me, but you send me an email every single week with five different pillars of what's going on in your life. And it's really been this cool accountability thread that you just started and you sent to me. And, and one of them is listen more, talk less, like you said. And I think that can be transformative, like of all the things you've done and they're all incredible. Like that to me is maybe the easiest to implement in a cosmic scheme of things, but maybe not so easy because I think most people want to talk about themselves all the time.

15:09You know, we are, we are the stars of our own movie. As I've said many times, like we're with ourselves 24 hours a day. We are the center of our own universe. But I think the way that you make real connection with people is by asking them questions. And I love that you hit on that. I'd love to hear you talk about how that has impacted your life more broadly. it's it's helped me personally because you know i have this thing where like i love to challenge myself and i love to suffer a little bit harder every day right no matter what it is whether it's physical whether it's mental and the physical side i found is the first real stepping stone right it's like if you can challenge yourself physically that's fine but to challenge yourself mentally, it's a whole new level of self-control, right?

15:58There are things that I want to say. There are things that I want to respond to people, but I have to stop and think, is this going to move them forward? Is my response going to make them a better person? Is my response self-serving? And don't get me wrong, I'm not perfect at it, right? I screw up plenty of times, but I really try to make a conscious effort that what I say is helping them. And it's not just a self-serving story of, oh, you did this? Well, yeah, I did this too. So that's really that fine line I walk with really trying to listen to them and help them. Because you've said it before, we learn through stories, right?

16:44That's really how we grow. so how do I talk about what I've been through but using it so other people can grow themselves as well yeah I love that and as you're saying in there like the reflexive need to respond I think so many so many of us have that and it it's almost like uh even if you're not consciously doing it it's like a one-upsmanship right like oh you did that well here's what I did and it's really a need to feel seen, a need to feel special, a need to feel whatever, but it's so detrimental to actual connection I've found. And it reminds me of the famous Viktor Frankl quote that we can't say enough.

17:26And this is really the underpinning, I think to me, of inner work generally. And I think that's been another, I don't know if you term it that way, but that's been another one of your five pillars is inner work. And this quote is, between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and freedom. And Bill, to me, that Frankl quote is everything. Because if you can just create that little bit of space between that stimulus and response, you're listening to this and maybe you're reactive. We're all reactive. If you can just find it somehow to create that little bit of space, I promise you it will make your life better in a noticeable and appreciable way.

18:12It will absolutely. And Bill, as you're saying, it's in all aspects of life. But it is not easy. Let's be clear. It's something you need to work on for months and years. But to me, that is freedom. Yeah. Like I was saying, a good catalyst to it is challenging yourself physically. Because in your journey with weightlifting, that part of it, you become regimented in that and you build up those habits. Because I'm a big fan of James Clear's book, Atomic Habits. I try to read it once a year to really refresh myself and, okay, what habits am I trying to build and what old habits no longer serve me and going through that.

18:54And yeah, I think the habit of physical endurance is good. And then once you kind of have gotten that to a certain level, you start breaking into that mental space regardless. Like for me, you know, from running, right. I was the person that was like, Hey, you never, as a human being in today's society, you should never have to run more than one mile. If you do, you got bigger problems. And this year I'm training for a 50 mile ultra marathon. So it's like, you know, we change, we grow, but I think that mental aspect starts creeping into the physical aspect. And then you start realizing how much things are intertwined in that way.

19:40Yeah, I love that. So physicality and physical pursuits, doing hard things as the lead domino, in essence, in your case. Now, does that mean everybody has to start with that? No, of course. We're never giving blanket advice, right? But Bill, I agree with you. That's worked for me exceptionally well. And it's really, like you're saying about habits. How can we form habits? How can we maybe even stack good habits? You think about just little things like, hey, what if I'm going on the exercise bike and I'm reading at the same time or listening to an audio book? Is that going to work for everybody?

20:13Is that my advice? No, not necessarily, but that could work for a whole heck of a lot of people. How can you stack habits? I think for me, the biggest thing has been, can I get into a routine? Can I prove to myself? It's a little check mark in your corner every time you go to the gym or every time in your case, you go out, I know you were trying to run a 5k every single day for 2024. And now you're preparing for a 50 mile race, which is absolutely wild. And like, every time you went out and ran a 5k, that was a checkmark in the I'm the type of person that can do hard things, right? Like for me, it's every time I go to the gym, it's another checkmark in I'm the type of person that dot, dot, dot wants to be healthy, and is going to do what he can to get there.

20:58And none of us are getting any younger, right? So it's just not the way the world works, except for Benjamin Button, maybe. But like, I mean, I'm 45 years old, and I am in by far the best physical shape of my life. I mean, I'm going to the gym and maxing out most of the machines. Like, I mean, it's crazy. And it's been a lot of years, but it's really been the last two years of concerted effort with Dean Turner, my trainer. And it's been amazing. That does like you prove to yourself that you can do hard things. And I think that's massive though, right? Yeah. Thanks for listening to choose a fi and for all your support of our mission here.

21:37The absolute best way to support choose a fi is when you sign up for your next rewards credit card to use our cards page at choose about a com slash cards. I keep this page constantly updated. So it should always be the top resource for you. Thanks for being part of our community and for your support. So Bill, I think like we were saying that physicality then gets you to the point where you can focus on your inner game. And I think, I think a lot of us, and again, I don't want to paint a broad brush. I hate doing that, but like, especially a lot of us males are notorious for not doing inner work.

22:12And I think what's been so cool. I know about my own journey really over the last eight years, since I reconnected with my friend, Dominic Cortuccio, who's been on the podcast a number of times is I've joined mastermind groups. I've joined inner work groups of, of, in my case, in men who are all on a journey of self-discovery of self-improvement of connection. And I think it's really been, it's been a total game changer for me to be able to open up and relate to people and see that, frankly, all of us, no matter how successful we appear, we're all dealing with things. We're all humans. And I think it's easy in the Facebook and Instagram world to look at people's absolute best moments out of 365 days and think that that's life.

22:56And the reality is that's not life. That's a carefully curated, sometimes totally fictional appearance of what a life is. And I think for really all of us, it's about doing the work and it's about trying to connect. And like you said, listening more, talking less, like actually finding people to connect with. I'd love to hear you talk about how that inner work aspect has really helped you. Spirituality, I know, is really important to you. Talk us through how that's been transformative. Yeah. So I would say finding the podcast has really been the catalyst to self-improvement, right? I always tell people, when I share your podcast with my friends and that, I always tell them, it started out as a financial podcast, but it's more of a life optimization podcast and every aspect of it.

23:46Right. So it's spurred me into reading more and doing more. You know, I haven't drank since New Year's day, 2022. Wow. Congrats. Thanks. Yeah. That's been a huge thing for me. Got involved more in my church men's group. Now I actually lead my church men's group with another gentleman. So that's really helped me along in regards to kind of what we were talking about, right? Like we're all going through stuff. and in that group, you know, we've got people from so many different backgrounds and we find like over the last year, the more that we share, the more that everybody else shares. And when new guys kind of come in, it's like the more vulnerable we are, the more everybody else feels vulnerable to be honest, to be like, Hey, I'm struggling with this.

24:36Hey, I need help with this. And I don't think we just, we don't have that in life, right? We have to wear this, hey, we're at work. So boom, you got to be in work mode. And to a certain extent, I get it, right? Like you can't sometimes let your outside life affect your professional life. But do we have those people? Do we have those groups? Do we have even the capacity to open up and be honest about things? I think when we do that, again, it not only helps us, you know, it truly helps us so much. It's unbelievable, but to watch how much it helps other people is life transforming, right? You see guys that just come in, you know, don't even realize that this type of transformation exists in life.

25:23When you share things, when you work through problems, when you have, you know, accountability partners, whether it's through your church, through even just emailing you, right? Like sending that email every week, it's like, it forces me to go back and go, okay, what did I do? Did I do anything? You know, and being honest about it. Yeah. I love that. Accountability is so huge. And I know like Brian Feraldi, who's been on the show a number, so many times and we text each other every week. So going back to the physical aspect, when he's doing Dean's workouts now as well, whenever we finished work and we just send each other, Hey, upper a done or lower B done.

26:03And it's just like that little check-in. You're not looking for a response necessarily, but it's just, Hey, I did it. Yeah. I'm here. Right. And I showed up and I think that it's really, really important. Yep. My buddy who's running the 50 mile ultra with me, we're friends on, you know, map my run and that. And it's like, we're always checking in and like, we're seeing what they did, you know, commenting on it. Cause it just links automatically. We don't even have to send anything to each other. We just kind of like, Oh, Hey, good job on the run. You know, it auto posts. We don't have to worry about anything like that, but it's just that it's not even accountability, but it is that motivation.

26:39You know, it's that, Hey, we're in this together. We're going to do it together. It's going to be horrible. I'm sure it's going to be horrible. We're fully prepared for that, but we want to, we want to push through it together, you know, and having that group that, you know, like you said before, that your tribe of people to get through those challenges, to come out the other side, building exponential growth off of things, off of the hard things in life. Yeah, I hear you. And one thing that jumped out to me too, and you're writing me this email every week, it's similar, frankly, to a journal.