TIP785: My Reflections on Money, Life, and Happiness w/ Stig Brodersen

26:46I would want to watch. And if I get bored after 10 seconds, I can jump to another video that promised me eternal youth, ultimate riches, or whatever the YouTube deities are promising us these days. Now, I don't think the algorithms are making us happier. They tell us that we can have everything we desire, but we can't. We may be able to get anything, but we certainly won't be able to get everything. And I was not surprised to learn recently that singlehood is on the rise throughout the developed world. Among Americans aged 25 to 34, the proportion of living without a spouse or partner has doubled over the past five decades to 50 % for men and 41 % for women.

27:29Now, how can you find a spouse who is customized exactly to your needs, who looks exactly the way you want them to, who has the education and wealth you want them to have? And of course, if you don't feel it's perfectly customized to you when you want it, you can always swipe, not good enough. People don't work that way. We're all imperfect. And while everyone can get a wonderful spouse and a terrific friend, in life as in business, you can get, you guessed it, I've said it more than once, anything but not everything. And the sooner you realize that, the happier you'll be. Trust me, I speak from better experience.

28:05Reflection number six, what is your unfair advantage. In business, investing in life, you tilt your odds in your favor if you lean into your unfair advantages. One of our salespeople would buy tickets to podcast conferences, or I should say, he's not buying the actual ticket to the event. He flies to the event, chats up people in the lobby, and just starts networking. What an unfair advantage to have, and the reason why he's such a great salesman. Another example, a friend of mine buys and flips houses. His wife is a veteran, so they can buy a primary residence with no money down. His father-in-law is a contractor who can get materials at cost, and together they're quite handy, and they can do a lot of the renovation themselves.

28:47And once they live there for two years, they can sell and pay no taxes on the gain. In the game of capitalism, my friend has an unfair advantage. Of course, not unfair in the sense that I begrudge people who serve the country and get in privileges, but unfair in the sense that if you don't have any of those advantages, it's just harder to compete. It's like playing football and simply being faster than your opponents. You need to be able to do a lot of things right to compete with someone who has advantages you don't have. It's not impossible to win against unfair advantages, nor is an unfair advantage a guarantee of success, but the latter is a good place to start looking.

29:22Now, I don't think you need to spend many minutes with me before you see my shortcomings. If I began listing them, we will never end this episode. For starters, I can't lean into my expertise in, I don't know, semiconductors or cryptography. It's essentially non-existent. And don't get me started on my fear of rejection. But there are a few, very few things where I may have an unfair advantage. For many people, money burns a hole in their pocket, and they never seem to have enough to buy with the wand. I like to save and hopefully to gradually work myself down to only spending 10 % of my income.

29:58You can say that it's an unfair advantage to be wired that way. So as I'm building my portfolio, I need to lean into that. For example, if you spend within your means, you're not to the whims of Mr. Market as you would if you live above your means, which makes portfolio decisions that much harder. Now, I don't know what your unfair advantage is. Many of the best businesses were built on unfair advantages. Bill Gates had access to a computer's unlimited his programming time when almost no one else in the world had. And it was easy for him, but not for others to stay focused and program for days on end.

30:31He would literally fall asleep while coding, wake up and continue coding where he left off. It was just one of his many unfair advantages. Or take Jeff Bezos. People often credit him with superhuman discipline or extraordinary foresight. But one of his earliest unfair advantages was simply how his mind is wired. He had an unusually long time horizon, almost unnaturally so. Bezos funded this wonderful 10 ,000-year clock buried inside a mountain in Texas. It's designed to tick once a year, and it has a so-called century hand that moves, you guessed it, once a century. Yes, there is a reason why Bezos famously said that he's surprised when people congratulate him on a good quarter, because that quarter has been planned years in advance.

31:17And it leads me to another reflection I want to share with you. If one side of the coin is to seek out a situation where you hold an unfair advantage, the other side is knowing when you don't and having the discipline to cap your downside. In investing, I could tell you to stay within your circle of competence, but I found the same applies to my interactions with people. For most of my life, I was terrified of people seeing me at my worst. And I'm not past that, Certainly not fully. But one of the quiet secrets of adulthood, at least for me, has been learning to tell people when I'm not at my best, to name it before it shows up in some awkward, unhelpful way.

31:55Not too long ago, I knew I'd be meeting a friend of my co-host, William and Kyle, and I wanted to make a good first impression. But I also knew that the setting, a dinner party, just isn't my scene. So I asked him if we could jump on a call before meeting in person, because I knew the version of me he would meet just wouldn't be that good. And the funny thing, when you're honest about your limits, people are almost always kinder and more understanding than you expect. Think about it. When was the last time someone told you that they were having a bad day and your reaction was, great, let's make it even worse?

32:29It doesn't happen. Instead, you soften. You see the interaction through a different lens. Sometimes people you speak with are not as kind or they don't seem as present as you had hoped for. But you can browse past it quickly because you have plenty of days where you just weren't the best version of yourself either. And that takes me to the seventh reflection. Welcome surprises of growing wealth. And I have to say that it's with great hesitation that I included this segment in the episode. And, you know, I think this is such a challenging thing to discuss because we all have such specific expectations and definitions of what a good life should look like.

33:12And I'm also mindful of the fact that it might sound boastful, as in, oh, you have money, so let's hear how perfect your life is because of that. And I hope it doesn't come across as that. And don't worry, this subsequent segment will all be about the unwelcome surprises of growing wealth. So there are plenty. But I've found that happiness is resolves mind's expectations. And it's one of the reasons why you find these wonderful Buddhist monks to be quite happy. They train to have low expectations. And I have to say that until I turned 30, I always had someone in my life I didn't really like and took up more space than I wanted them to have.

33:54And it basically boiled down to one thing. I was put together with people I didn't want to be with. And in school, there was always someone, you know, not as in, I hope the worst for you and your future kids dislike, but someone I would just prefer not to be a part of my life. Sometimes it was something they said to me, but most often it was just like oil and water. It's just, I wasn't sure why, but we just didn't, well, click. And of course, in school, you really can't do much about it. In elementary school, you're together with fellow pupils because you happen to live in the same zip code. And even in college, while you might have some interests in the same courses, it doesn't guarantee you have much in common or that you like each other.

34:36And of course, after I graduated, I had different jobs with the same issues. Some coworkers were just nicer to be around than others. Now, running the Amethyst Podcast Network, I only work with people I like. And I don't pretend that everyone on our 20-person team is the best friend I ever had, but I don't work together with people I dislike. And whenever you add to that, that I don't have a commute, I cannot begin to explain how much it has done for my mental wellbeing and how often I avoid being a bad version of myself because I chose the people I spend time with. And so, you know, whenever I was younger, I looked at business owners as people who were never off the clock and perhaps I even sometimes felt sorry for them.

35:20But I didn't question a life where you were frequently around people you didn't like. I never tried anything different, so how would I know? And today, I don't want to be off the clock. I'm yet to need a break from being with awesome people who want to build awesome things. They say that a man has two lives. The second one starts when he realizes he only has one. And this might be the midlife crisis talking, but when I realized how much it meant to my happiness or lack thereof to spend time with who I like for as long as I like and where I like, You know, working with the right people became even more important.

35:58I sometimes read books and listen to podcasts about the sacrifices people who work all the time make. They're constantly sacrificing friends and family whenever they're working and vice versa. And if you work with the right people in the right way, it might feel less like a trade-off and more like a blessing where you can have your cake and eat it too. And of course, the best things in life aren't things. It's typically your relationship with people for better or worse that determine whether you're happy or not. But money buys you time and flexibility to spend your time with the people you want to spend time with.

36:33And with all of that being said, I sometimes feel lonely, especially before I met my wife, I felt more lonely than I care to admit. And I think one of the reasons was that I just didn't know many people who were on the same wavelength as me. But then of course, powered by the internet, I today know hundreds of people who are, but few of them are in my proximity. So I have to go to Omaha around the world to meet people who are as passionate about value investing as I am and take it for what it is, but money makes that possible. And you don't need an obscene amount of money to travel the world and meet kindred spirits, but I just found that a regular average paycheck and two weeks vacation simply wouldn't allow me to do that.

37:17And growing up, I didn't appreciate how important it was to find these kindred spirits. Sure, I liked watching movies, playing football, and hanging out with my friends. But meeting people where you just get excited from having a conversation about the intersection of business, investing, and life was never something I considered possible. And surely, not in person, regardless of where they're based. And it might be my cultural bias talking, but being a born and raised Dane, you're constantly told that money doesn't bind you happiness. And the way this is typically proved, and I put proved in quotation marks, is by pointing to one of the wealthy individuals in the country and then have someone saying, look, this guy died from cancer, or look, this guy got a divorce.

38:05It's likely because he liked money more than his family. And I have to be honest, to me, it sounds like sour grapes. Sure, if you are unlucky and get cancer, it may not be so that any amount of money can save us. But money still buys access to better healthcare and improve your odds, everything else equal. And speaking about divorces, 4 % of all marriages end in divorce. And I know a lot of poor people who got divorced and money problems certainly didn't make their relationships any better. And yes, 99 or whatever kind of high number of problems does not go away because of money, but some are just less bad if you do have money.

38:48And while you can say that above a certain threshold, more money doesn't buy you extra happiness, it sure has the power to remove many negative emotions. I once heard some say that rich people can spend a lot of money suing each other, which poor people just can't afford. And maybe that is true in some circles, but from what I've experienced, the fiercest argument about money happened among those who don't have enough of it. And whenever the adults in the household have healthy relationship with money and enough flexibility to get what they want, well, money stops being a battlefield. And perhaps I have the wrong data points or I live too much in my own bubble.

39:27Perhaps I'd think differently if I knew the top 10 wealthiest people in the world, who by definition are somewhat extreme. But from what I've seen, a million dollars in annual income buys you more peace of mind than$100 ,000, everything else equal. And this is not my way of saying that capitalism is fair or anyone can just go out there and make a million dollars in annual income. I'll be the first to say that the world is unfair. Luckily, sometimes it's unfair to your advantage. For example, many who listen to this podcast are great at allocating capital, and it pays much better than saving lives as a nurse and you even pay less in taxes.

40:02But frequently, the world is unfair and money surely doesn't make you happier on a straight line up and to the right. So let's also talk about some of the unwelcome surprises of growing wealth. And I know I sound like a jerk and I certainly feel like one whenever I'm recording this. I really feel I can't win on this one called unwelcome surprises of growing wealth. And honestly, I even considered not publishing the episode because of it. If I didn't include the not so nice things about becoming wealthier, you might rightly say that I sugarcoated having money. And if I did include a segment about all welcome surprises of growing wealth, you would rightly say that the problems I list aren't real problems.

40:46And I don't really like to play games where I can only lose, but here we go nonetheless. the less. So I mentioned this segment before that happiness is expectations minus results. And when you imagine yourself with money, you typically imagine that one thing is getting better, the car you can now drive, the watch you wear, or the vacation you can go on if you have much more money. And then you assume that the rest of your life stays the same. That is not how it works. You get accustomed to things. And let me give you an example. The first time I flew a business class, I felt like the king of the world.

41:22If I fly business today, I mainly think about how bored I am and whenever I would arrive at my destination. And if the passenger sitting next to me is annoying, I get 10 times annoyed because I paid for business and I pretend that annoying passengers should stay in the economy, though the reality might just be the opposite. And of course, these examples are anecdotal and more than anything, they're a microcosm of the unexpected so-called problems you encounter as you become wealthier. So please take them more for the metaphorical part than the actual example. Because how does someone dare complain about flying business class?

41:57If your problems are small, and then that's all you have, well, they artificially just inflate. Yes, the world is just not that kind. Because your reality changes with money. And I was speaking with a friend the other day, and he happened to mention that he was middle class. And I had to call him out because both him and his wife were very successful business people, and they have a combined total of 3 ,000 employees reporting to them. But whenever I called him out, my friend looked at me and said, without blinking, that he just came from a meeting with another friend who had 4 ,000 people reporting to him.

42:32So he felt he was firmly in the middle class. And that might seem like an extreme example and that my friend has no sense of reality, but I do see it all the time. We focus on what we don't have rather than what we do have. And I don't know what the technical term is for this, and I'm sure there are some. So I call this unique condition being human. Let's take a quick break and hear from

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46:27I made it. The point is, you get used to things. You look at what people around you have, especially those who have more than you. And what used to look appealing is suddenly the new normal whenever you get there. And then you want more. People living on a dollar a day are so far removed that you don't really feel a sense of gratitude whenever you see it. And you likely don't want to say that out loud. I certainly don't, even though I just did it. It's not politically correct to do so. But it's so much easier to look at your neighbor's bigger house and feel envy that to feel gratitude that you have clean drinking water and access to electricity.

47:02And you might think that you would be happy moving into this new neighborhood and never compare yourself to anyone again. But after some time, most people will. Remember my friend from before who felt like 3 ,000 employees were like being middle class. He, and it doesn't surprise you, he lives in a very nice neighborhood. And whenever he bought his car, his newest car, as you say, which was a slick Porsche, and the third car in the household, he didn't fail to mention that it wasn't a nice car compared to the other cars in that's what he called middle-class neighborhood. And he didn't mention to me that, well, half of the world's population is living in less than$10 a day, and that driving a car, any car, should make us feel privileged.

47:44And of course, I'm no better than my friend, though. I never owned a car, but I'll be the first to say as much as I know that envy is the only thing you can't have fun with, it's not a foreign feeling for me. And I too have this unique condition called being human. And I hesitate to bring up the next point. If someone had complained about this 10 years ago, I would likely just have walked away from that person. And that is going to be my disclaimer. Well, here we go. And you can decide if you want to turn off the episode if you haven't done so already. I love the Godfather movies. Well, not so much the third one, but honestly, that's a story for another day.

48:25But what really stayed with me was this small cultural detail woven into the narrative. Early in the first film, there's this brilliant scene where Don Vito Caglione sits in his dark study while one by one, people approach him asking for favors. They come with problems, grievances, and requests for justice. All of it presented with deep respect and the expectation that the dawn will help. And that moment isn't just cinematic flair. It's actually rooted in real Sicilian tradition. On the day of a daughter's wedding, a Sicilian patriarch is expected to be generous, gracious, and unable to refuse a request.

49:04And turning someone away would be considered dishonorable, even unlucky. So in that scene, it's not just neighbors and credences showing up. It's everyone who has ever needed something from the dawn, all waiting for the one day he cannot say no. It's such a subtle but perfect way to introduce who he is and how the entire community depends on him. And to me, that was such a cool scene. You know, you sit there and you're this rich and powerful man. You're able to say yes or no to people's request. And then you realize when you have money, a lot of people are prospecting you and you end up saying no a lot.

49:43And it turns out that it's a lot less fun to do that than what it looks like in the movies. And you might be thinking, if having money is hard because you have to say no all the time, but being an employee who cannot afford to say no is also hard, isn't it just a question of choosing your heart? Sort of. And yes, your point is well taken. And I do know that I probably shouldn't complain about this. All of that being said, let's go back to the scene of the Godfather. What struck me the most in that scene is in a way, it's really not about money. It's about obligation. But Don isn't just powerful because he's rich.

50:20He's powerful because everyone around him believes he could or should owe them something. And that's the real weight he carries. And it's the best, but it's also the worst thing that comes from growing wealth. And it is a good reminder that in life, some of the most demanding responsibilities comes from relationships and expectations. But more about that later for better or for worse. Because it does take me to my ninth reflection here, which is about being useful in the best way you can. Since I was a kid, my parents always taught me to do charity work. And as a child, I didn't think too much about it.

50:54I considered everything my parents told me at the time to be true. I had to say then, And in my preteen years, I've said to say that I felt it was a little embarrassing. You know, I was in this material phase. Perhaps I still am. I don't know. But I remember being fascinated by expensive things. And I felt it was weird to ask people for money and then give that money to someone else. And I vividly remember my mother having this, what to me was a magical card that let her get anything she wanted. it. And I was just flabbergasted why she just wouldn't buy anything I wanted or give that money to the poor instead of doing charity work.

51:36And of course, it turned out that the so-called magical card was just a regular credit card. And well, it was just around the time when everyone stopped using cash. But anyways, it seemed quite magical at the time. But it wasn't until I was 20 that I started doing charity work on my own. And perhaps it was because of my parents' influence. I'm not sure, but I volunteer in the local refugee organization. And looking back, I don't really know if I added any value to the refugees. I had very low practical skills and even fewer social skills, and we helped them with a variety of things. One was to teach them how to read and write Danish, and another was to teach them how to ride a bike.

52:19And you might be thinking, why would anyone learn how to ride a bike? Well, partly riding a bike is how you get around here. But then there's also a lot of odd jobs you can take on if your skillset isn't matched too well with the labor market, and you also don't speak the local language. So it's actually a very, very useful skill here. So I was literally running around with an adult on a bike and then having a broom at the back to make sure they didn't crash. And it was a brand new world opening up. because at the time, I didn't think of myself as privileged at all, even though my parents told me that we were.

52:54I felt like we were just like everyone else in the neighborhood wherever I grew up. But really working with refugees put everything into perspective. So despite feeling like I was a broke student, I probably shouldn't complain. I was making a decent living playing co-workers out of my studies. And this happened to coincide with the charity work. And of course, In the beginning, I felt like the man, being able to make money in poker. But slowly, but also surely, spending my time helping others gave me much more purpose than, well, taking other people's money for a living. And yes, I know what you're thinking.

53:31Go figure. Volunteering was a powerful experience. And being useful, especially for those less unfortunate than ourselves, may be an option. I have systematically given away money for the last 18 years. And you might think that by now I would know how to do it and do it in a good way. And today I honestly think I still do it poorly, but perhaps less poorly than what I used to. And I wanted to share a few reflections with you. One thing is to do charity for those less unfortunate than yourself. That is no easy task, but ironically, I found it even harder to give money to those who have enough, but just not as much as you do.

54:19As you grow older and you can donate larger sums of money, you may feel compelled to help loved ones, perhaps their friends or family. And a child who is 18 years old may on paper be broke, but if they're born into a top 1 % family, are they truly broke? How do you teach that child to be resilient, but at the same time, always wanting to give your child enough to do anything, but not enough to do nothing. And I have to say that answering that is surely above my pay grade. But I do have some experience helping friends with money, and it's both giving me a lot of purpose and a few headaches too.

54:57One approach to take is to never put a dollar between you and a friend. And if that is your approach, I don't fault you for it. I sometimes wish that And that was the road that I had taken, and it showed it would have made my life simpler in many ways. At the same time, helping friends make their dream come true, it's just been a wonderful experience. And I would, with no hesitation, do it again. And if you have chosen to listen to this podcast, you may be more privileged than you think you are at first glance. For starters, you likely don't have friends whose unattainable dream is to feed their family and not live on the streets.

55:39Perhaps your friend wants to start a business or perhaps buy the dream home. With most things in life, you don't only get the upside, and this is no different. Things may change in your relationship and some of it not for the better. Whether that change in your relationship outweighs the joy you give the other person by helping them, I leave up to you. Because I was well aware of the potential trap I was walking into when I lent money to friends. And I found a few techniques to counter that. The first thing is to let your friends say face. And depending on your dynamic, you can sign a loan document so it doesn't look like charity, but a true business transaction.

56:19And it might seem odd, especially if you're like me, you know you're never going to see that money again. But remember, you're not doing it for you, you're doing it for your friend. And also remember, there is a selection process where people who need to borrow money from you are, well, typically not good with money in the first place. And then the next thing to do is to mentally accept that this is money you will never see again. And if some of the money gets back to you, you have already made an agreement with yourself that the entirety of that money will be donated to charity. And so this also implies that if your friend feels bad about not paying you back, you can tell them that the investment just didn't work out.

57:02And you experienced that multiple times in the stock market, which is likely also true, even with the best intentions and expectations. And of course, as you listen to this, I'm almost sure that many of you are not feeling rich. You might feel like you don't have enough money for yourself and certainly can't afford to donate money. And I don't know your circumstances, and you might very well be right. What I would encourage you to do is to be useful to others. Give an hour away or a dollar away to someone in need and see how it feels. You might get an unexpected happiness boost and want to do it again.

57:36And of course, you might find it to be a waste of time and money, and that is okay too. But you should get nothing out of this episode. That is the one takeaway. If you do decide to give it a try and don't get this happiness boost, perhaps you can be useful in a different way. You know, I can't help but share this reflection. I used to solely give away money in my own name. And at the time, I simply couldn't fathom why anyone would give away money anonymously. And it doesn't reflect well on me, but getting the praise and seeing my name as a donor just meant more than what I care to admit at the time.

58:13Now today, my wife and I donate money anonymously, and we have taken more joy in doing that, which I would have never expected. And another thing I have surprisingly found to be very useful is donating money in someone else's name. Even though I also have to say it took me a long time to get around to it. And I don't pretend that there is no selfless good deed. And then at the same time, why shouldn't you feel good about helping others? You know, if you give a homeless person a loaf of bread, it doesn't matter to him whether you're happy or sad when you do it. And if making you happy makes you want to do it again, it seems like everyone wins.

58:50And it takes me to the 10th and final reflection I want to share with you. And I call it the journey is the best part. I can easily understand if someone is sitting out there thinking that I'm proselytizing for telling you to give away money. And that is not my intention. Now, I've read that I'm still reading a lot of books about happiness. And while there are some coming themes, as you might imagine, there's also a lot of different advice that's very much tied to each author's own values. Many books would tell you to travel or spend time with your loved ones. Very few people would tell you that material possessions will make you happy.

59:26And there's certainly an element of truth to that. Happiness doesn't lie in possessions, at least not above a certain level. But if you subscribe to the idea that people are driven by incentives and authors like to sell books, how many authors writing about happiness would tell you to buy stuff you can't afford? Old books will tell you not to buy a fancy car and spend time with your family because that is what you're supposed to do. And I by and large sympathize with that, but I also wholeheartedly disagree with that. Now, I have friends who love fancy cars. They would go to different fairs to check them out, and sometimes they would buy older cars and fix them.

1:00:08And I sometimes think they would make a bug or two, but it's close to nothing in the grand scheme of things. And it's certainly not worth their time if they truly did it for the money. They just love cars. And then I have another friend. She has the best personality that you will ever meet. I've never heard anyone ever say anything negative about her. And the only reasonable complaint I could make is that there's only one of her. I truly believe that the world would be a better place if she could be cloned. And this wonderful friend cut ties with her father years ago. What can I say? He was a terrible person and I couldn't agree more with her decision.

1:00:48And on my end, no, I never owned a car and I couldn't find nicer people than my parents. But I would also be the first to cut ties for them if they weren't nice. And I would also be the first to say if owning a Ferrari makes me happier than giving away money to charities, I would probably buy a Ferrari any day. And I'm sure someone out there made the trade-off and is perfectly happy with that. The more I study happiness in history books, the less I'm sure of how many universal truths there are about money and happiness. We're such a product of our time, and it's hard to see the forest for the trees.

1:01:27Experiences are supposedly making us happier than things. Well, the king of Egypt didn't travel to Babylonia to enjoy the view, and perhaps he thought traveling wouldn't make him happy, or perhaps he didn't. And I once heard a criticism about consumerism that said something along the lines of, we all buy things we don't need to impress people we don't like. And that's probably true. And it's certainly not something I encourage you to lean into. At the same time, I like nice stuff. And perhaps society has tricked me into believing that I like things I don't really like. Perhaps I'm fooling myself.

1:02:07I don't really think about it in those terms. Sometimes nice stuff is, well, nice. And sometimes it makes me, well, happier having nice stuff than not having it. And believe me, I tried both and I know what I prefer. But of course, that said, I never believed in the idea that the one with the most toys would win. On the contrary, I've always had a deep respect for monks who chose to live without possessions and their pursuit of enlightenment. But to me, not owning anything nice seemed like a terrible, sad way to live your life. And not in a way that a monk isn't living a good life, but because we're all different and just want different things.

1:02:46So for me, proselytizing about money, life, and happiness is exactly what I want to avoid. Much of what works for me likely won't work for you and vice versa. And that is absolutely terrific. That is the premise of this episode. And with that said, there is one thing I feel strongly about sharing, and I hope you take a moment to reflect on it. Whatever you choose to do with your money to increase your happiness, make sure that the journey is the best part.

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