Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - Fear and Finance with Farnoosh Torabi

00:00:00.000 Hey, y'all. Hi. Hi. Good to be here with you. Today, I want to talk a little bit about

00:00:13.460 fear. There's a lot to be afraid of in the world today. I'm terrified of so many things.

00:00:22.400 so many. There's actual real threats to democracy, to the planet, to our livelihoods. And then

00:00:32.480 there's the fears that, you know, seem very personal to me, the fears of not being a good

00:00:39.620 enough mom, not being a good enough wife, not being a good enough daughter and friend. I mean,

00:00:44.120 it's all the not being good enoughs. Mostly, I think we all have a fear of stability or of

00:00:52.300 instability, of not being taken care of, of not having security. For me, my biggest fear is job

00:01:00.660 security. There was a story in Esquire the other day about how novelists essentially have never

00:01:07.480 had it worse in the history of novelists, how it's just how this is the low point for the

00:01:15.260 profession, to which I, you know, freaked out immediately because, yeah, that's a real, that's

00:01:21.680 real kick in the nuts. And told my husband I was going to switch careers and started looking into

00:01:28.860 being an electrician, a plumber. I've been told that there is good money in plumbing and plumbing

00:01:34.660 supplies in particular. There was an ad yesterday while I was watching the footballs about becoming

00:01:40.500 a pilot. And Nick told me I was too old for that. And I told him to shut his goddamn mouth.

00:01:46.640 And then, you know, I started freaking out about money the way we always freak out about money 1.00

00:01:51.500 when we freak out about our careers and our professions. And I was very vocal about this.

00:01:56.180 I talked about it out loud. And what do you know? What do you know? My phone started listening to me.

00:02:08.160 And so then when I was on my endless social media scroll that I promised myself that I won't do

00:02:15.120 before bedtime. I just, I just happen upon a new financial influencer who has never been in my

00:02:22.280 feed before, but Instagram thinks I need to see. And this post was like, are you terrified about

00:02:28.600 the future? And I'm like, yeah, yeah, I fucking am. And it's like, do you have enough money for 0.98

00:02:35.060 retirement? And I'm like, I don't know. Probably not. Can you afford to send your kids to college?

00:02:41.120 Not now. Isn't college like a gazillion dollars? And so then I go on this dark rabbit hole and I

00:02:49.160 click and I click and I click. And this person tries to sell me a course for $500. There are a

00:02:55.680 lot of financial influencing charlatans out there right now. And yet, if I'm a person that's worried

00:03:04.260 about retirement accounts and kids college funds, am I going to click? Am I maybe going to buy this

00:03:09.980 course from this person who is definitely not even a certified accountant. This is probably

00:03:15.320 a dude who lives in his mom's basement. But I might buy it. I might. It felt a little like

00:03:23.540 entrapment. It really did. The truth is, I do want to talk to someone, someone very smart,

00:03:29.280 about investing and what to do with my money and whether or not I should just quit being a novelist

00:03:36.240 and a podcaster and go be a person that sells pipes and faucets and things like that. And I

00:03:43.180 also want to talk to someone about my fear. I do. Luckily, I happen to know a personal finance guru

00:03:52.520 who also just wrote a book about fear. Yeah, yeah. It's a two for one here. A two for one.

00:04:01.820 because I don't know anything about plumbing.

00:04:04.480 I've got to keep writing books, guys.

00:04:06.640 I've got to keep doing it.

00:04:09.160 Hello, Joe.

00:04:11.460 I'm so excited that you're here with me today.

00:04:15.440 Will you tell our audience who you are?

00:04:17.820 Hi, audience.

00:04:18.780 I'm Farnoosh.

00:04:20.380 Sometimes people call me Noosh.

00:04:22.520 I'm a personal finance journalist.

00:04:24.920 I'm an Iranian-American.

00:04:26.440 I've known Joe for over maybe 15 years.

00:04:31.000 long time. Long time. And I have a financial education platform. I write books. I host a

00:04:40.160 podcast called So Money. I speak. I do all sorts of things in the realm of personal finance. And

00:04:47.680 I love it. And I'm so excited to be here with you, Jo. Well, and I first off, I love that you love

00:04:53.800 because I don't love it. I want to love it more. I want to be better at it as an independent woman

00:05:03.220 in the world who wants to build wealth and do good things with my money. But I'm just constantly

00:05:13.100 at a loss for what to do. And that terrifies me, which is why I do want to shamelessly plug your

00:05:21.640 new book really, really quickly. It just came out and it is called A Healthy State of Panic.

00:05:28.280 Tell us just a little bit about it because I think it's exactly what I need.

00:05:32.180 Right. Well, thank you for sharing that you are terrified. A lot of us won't even admit that.

00:05:37.840 And I wanted to write a book that this is my fourth book. I've written many financial books

00:05:42.720 and this has been now 10 years after my last book, more or less. It was intentionally supposed

00:05:48.500 be a memoir, a sloppy memoir. My editor said, I feel like there's a pattern here where you have

00:05:55.360 had a really interesting relationship with fear as you have worked your way through your financial

00:06:01.460 life as well as your career and your relationships. What do you think it is about fear and you

00:06:05.760 that's so interesting? And I said, you know, I think I just really appreciate fear. I kind of

00:06:11.000 love fear. Fear has been my friend. And she said, well, that's unusual. So I think we should

00:06:15.780 dig into that. And then, so I have this very personal relationship with fear, which we can

00:06:20.880 get into, but professionally, having worked in personal finance for over two decades, I feel as

00:06:27.200 though the emotional underpinning of so many of our money questions is fear. Whether it's because

00:06:32.220 we're scared to know how to figure it all out, we're scared to invest, we're scared to ask for

00:06:38.880 a raise. It is the fear that, and our lack of having a real good emotional intelligence with

00:06:44.800 that fear that prevents us from being able to use it constructively. And that's what a healthy

00:06:48.660 state of panic is all about. It's like fear is normal. Fear is a part of our lives and we should

00:06:55.860 be thankful for it. But, you know, there's a right and a wrong way to use fear. And I want to teach

00:07:00.600 us how to be more intentional with this emotion, to use it as a tool to get us closer to the next

00:07:09.680 decision that we need to make in these high stakes moments that involve our money and our careers.

00:07:16.380 I love that. I love that. Let's get let's all get comfortable with our fear today. Let's just

00:07:21.240 let's embrace it. Let's love it. Let's order it a cheese plate and let it eat all the cheese.

00:07:28.460 I want to get more into the fear. But first, I want to talk about something that does

00:07:35.980 freak me out that does i think what what inspires a lot of my fear around personal finance is

00:07:43.880 on the social medias which we talk about most of the time on this podcast when i'm not talking

00:07:51.120 about my own book which i'm desperately afraid of launching into this world the sicilian

00:07:57.020 inheritance everyone pre-order it now uh is i get a lot of a lot of conflicting advice

00:08:03.800 on social media I feel like financial influencers are now a thing are they a thing is that a is

00:08:10.900 that a category of influencer it is it is a phenomenon and I've been in this and you know

00:08:20.240 you and I we started out in the trenches of analog media like we did not have yes yes do you remember

00:08:27.820 like just, I would write things in a notebook. I would go to, you know, like before iPhones and

00:08:34.500 before Facebook and all that. And not to discredit, I think there are a lot of great financial

00:08:40.060 influencers. I think that for me, I don't want to carry that title. I think I'd prefer to say

00:08:46.520 I'm a financial educator. I'm also an author. I'm a journalist. I think that if you're only

00:08:52.200 hanging your hat on this title of being influential online, but you don't have anything else to your

00:08:57.720 credit i wonder about taking advice from you to be honest oh interesting interesting and so

00:09:04.880 well how do we tell how do we even tell who is qualified to give us advice or not i see

00:09:11.140 i see a lot of people that are the the fire people the you know save a lot now retire early

00:09:20.200 And they seem to have no credentials except for the fact that they've spent no money in the past three years.

00:09:31.720 Yeah, someone said the expression financial anorexia.

00:09:36.160 It's like, yeah, I think, look, I really appreciate personal stories in personal finance.

00:09:43.840 I think it's important to learn and see how others do what they do with their money.

00:09:49.700 It doesn't mean that that has to be what you do. I would be concerned if somebody in the FIRE movement who didn't, you know, who maybe was someone who did it. I mean, there's many ways to achieve financial independence. Retire early is the acronym that we're talking about. And I think that's even evolved. But when it first became a thing, it was very much a count your pennies and stay at home and don't, you know, basically spend any money, go on a spending diet and all the things.

00:10:18.200 And I think, you know, it was very interesting. They did make a lot of money. They did get themselves out of debt. They did maybe technically retire at 45 or what have you. But that's their story. And that's not to mean that that's how everyone should do it or that's even the best way to do things.

00:10:35.500 But I think it's interesting. I mean, I like to, I like to, I'm curious. I like to know how people do things and I don't ever say, okay, well, that has to be me. I think you have to have the wherewithal to go, okay, well, I'm going to maybe take an aspect of that and experiment that in my own life, but to think that I have to do it exactly and copy paste exactly how you've done it.

00:10:56.540 And therefore, that's how I'm going to be successful. I think that's a dangerous mindset and a dangerous way of doing and being. So I don't recommend that. And I think it's, again, to your point, the internet has gotten so busy and so loud and so conflicting. It's hard to kind of cut through the noise to figure out what should I do.

00:11:18.860 And I think for me, if I'm going to follow anybody online and any thought leadership or expertise, I want to know what are their credentials in addition to their personal story.

00:11:30.140 That's important.

00:11:30.900 I'd love I'd love an expert who's been there, done that.

00:11:33.980 That's how I kind of, I think, was able to differentiate when I started out because I wasn't trying to pretend I knew everything.

00:11:41.580 But I was saying I'm at the time I was 20 something living in New York, trying to rub two pennies together.

00:11:48.000 Here's what I've learned as a financial journalist, but also as a person who's trying to build

00:11:52.740 wealth for herself.

00:11:54.340 And I kind of stayed in that lane.

00:11:56.420 I didn't purport to be someone I wasn't, but being that I was also in the trenches with

00:12:02.420 my audience was an asset.

00:12:05.240 I wasn't their dad's CPA, for example, and that with unrelatable advice, and it was felt

00:12:12.580 like you were being talked down to.

00:12:14.220 So I'm all for that personality-driven financial advice, but there has to be credentials. I think there should be a body of work that precedes that or is in conjunction with that. That's me.

00:12:27.820 Totally. Well, one of the things that I do think is awesome is that social media and digital media generally has taken financial advice out of the purview of what I like to call the old rich men club.

00:12:44.900 And so we get to hear advice from so many different kinds of people who are not just old rich men, which I think is awesome, right?

00:12:54.840 That's what we want.

00:12:55.960 We want to be able to, whoever you are, wherever you are in your life stage, however you identify, to look out into the world of personal finance and see yourself represented.

00:13:05.600 Because seeing is believing.

00:13:07.500 When you see someone like you who's had a similar narrative, a similar lens through which they've seen the world, I think to know that that person can get out of debt, that person can build a business, that person can invest successfully, I think you're like, yeah, so sign me up too.

00:13:25.200 Sign me up too. I'm here for this. I'm here for all of it.

00:13:29.720 Are there any financial influencers who you follow, who you love?

00:13:33.800 that. I love Mrs. Dow Jones, Haley Sachs. I don't know anything about Mrs. Dow Jones.

00:13:42.080 Well, let me tell you, she is a, she's a zillennial financial expert. So she speaks more to that sort

00:13:49.260 of Gen Z, Gen Y in, you know, overlapping, I guess, 20 something young person who's like trying

00:13:59.860 to figure out. And she does a really cool thing where she brings financial advice and tips and

00:14:06.080 really brings in a lot of pop culture and plays with the zeitgeist really well, you know, and she

00:14:12.460 knows her audience really well. She doesn't purport to be like an investment expert or a tax expert,

00:14:17.460 but she's like a curious person who herself too has gone through her own journey with finance

00:14:23.620 and also getting laid off and everything.

00:14:25.740 And so I think she brings like a real honesty to the space

00:14:30.660 and it's fun.

00:14:33.000 I think that she has programs.

00:14:36.320 She's newer to the space.

00:14:38.100 So, and I think that's okay.

00:14:40.180 I was new to the space at one point too

00:14:41.840 and people took me seriously.

00:14:43.100 I don't think like your longevity

00:14:44.720 should discount you or not.

00:14:49.180 Like, I just think that you are where you're at

00:14:51.180 and your audience should know that.

00:14:52.900 So maybe while you're following Mrs. Dow Jones, maybe you're also following others for other things. But I think that's kind of what we're getting to, right? Like you want to create a portfolio of people to follow for different things. I don't think there's any more like one person knows everything. This is my messiah. And I mean, there are people like that, which I don't, you know, like the Dave Ramsey followers. And I think that's a whole other episode. And I'm happy to come back for that.

00:15:18.980 That's a whole other episode. Yes.

00:15:21.040 But it's a whole other series. Fine. I'll make another podcast. I love what you just called it. Portfolio of people that you follow. Much in the way that you create a portfolio for your money, I think that you should curate very highly who you follow and why. And also, I think it's very important to ask, why do you follow this person?

00:15:47.460 why do i follow this person or is that just why when you're creating your portfolio like why do

00:15:54.180 you follow someone oh i follow them because their advice is good or i follow them because they make

00:15:58.640 me feel good yeah and that's all valid and i think maybe they are educating me in a way where i feel

00:16:06.080 seen i feel like the information is accessible i think that they're not trying to just sell

00:16:12.280 to me so here's a red flag here's a real red flag there are a lot of people in the thought

00:16:16.860 leadership space, in the influencer space, I should say, not thought leadership. Because I

00:16:20.440 think thought leader, I think like a TED Talker and an author. Influencer is sort of its own

00:16:25.640 lane. And I think there are many people who know very well how to use social media as a tool

00:16:32.480 to get you to buy their shit. And that is a giant X for me. If your background is in marketing and 0.99

00:16:41.460 sales. And now suddenly you're really into health and wellness or personal finance or beauty or

00:16:49.660 whatever it is, mental health. And like everything about you is like, sign up for my this, go to my

00:16:56.520 website, get my course, buy my things, go to my shop site. I feel like that is just, and there

00:17:03.300 are people like that, but that's a really great way to, I think, differentiate who are the people

00:17:09.080 who are genuinely there to educate.

00:17:11.100 And of course, everybody should make money

00:17:12.340 and everybody is entitled to have profitable business plans.

00:17:16.940 But I think that if it seems to be like 80% of what they do,

00:17:22.740 someone said to me a good ratio is like,

00:17:25.400 80% education, 20% selling.

00:17:29.620 And again, it doesn't mean that making money is bad,

00:17:31.700 but as the recipient of that influencer's information,

00:17:36.160 I want to feel like I'm being supported and helped.

00:17:40.580 And it's coming from, you know, a pretty, a place that's not biased, right?

00:17:45.220 The place that's not biased because they don't, they're not just feeding me information to

00:17:48.940 put me into a funnel to get me to buy their, whatever it is.

00:17:53.120 Yeah, the course.

00:17:54.380 There's a lot of course selling these days on the social media.

00:17:57.740 Courses, memberships, member hubs.

00:18:00.360 Yeah.

00:18:00.860 Yes.

00:18:01.820 Yes.

00:18:02.440 I don't, I don't really want to buy a course.

00:18:05.180 I once bought a sleep training course just in the middle of the night when I was real fucking tired and and just sleep deprived and crazy, essentially.

00:18:16.940 And it was the worst thing that I've ever purchased in my entire life.

00:18:22.100 It was literally just some other sleep deprived woman on a video talking at me about how they once got their baby to sleep.

00:18:33.920 Oh, OK. 1.00

00:18:35.180 Let's give her some money. 1.00

00:18:36.800 I gave her money. 1.00

00:18:37.820 I gave her too much money.

00:18:40.380 So, Mrs. Dow Jones, who else should we be following for good, for useful financial advice?

00:18:47.160 And there's different kinds of categories, too, right?

00:18:49.980 Right now, I'm trying to—

00:18:51.340 Oh, sure.

00:18:52.180 Yeah.

00:18:53.140 So, the people that I really like, because they've been—here's, for me, this is like the Farnoosh formula.

00:18:59.500 Don't bring it.

00:19:00.640 These are my—these are also, like, the peers that I've had in this space for a while.

00:19:04.580 we've kind of grown up together and they've endured they haven't had like they haven't

00:19:09.600 burnt out they haven't been canceled they've been consistent in their advice they haven't

00:19:15.880 changed their tunes and honestly it's okay to change your tune because the world changes you

00:19:20.400 should evolve with the times but in terms of like they gave bad advice and now they give good advice

00:19:26.060 I think I like to follow Tiffany Aliche who's the budget nista she's got a best-selling book

00:19:32.000 new york times best-selling book she's been doing this for i think at least i don't know 10 15 years

00:19:38.580 um ramit saithi who is the author of i will teach you to be rich he and i kind of started at the

00:19:47.040 same time he has a extensive body of work he's very straightforward um he's a personality they

00:19:55.520 do all personalities too like i think at the end of the day you choose who you like and that's

00:20:01.840 fine but also make sure that they have some credentials and these folks definitely do

00:20:08.220 I like gosh I like Joe Salcihai who is a podcast called Stacking Benjamins he's great he's also

00:20:18.480 been in this game for a very long time and he's consistent and I can maybe send your audience a

00:20:25.060 list after this I can put it in your newsletter if you haven't subscribed to Joe's newsletter do

00:20:29.540 and we'll put that in there. Yes, yes. Well, this will also be over the influence, sub-stack.

00:20:36.880 Time for a quick break. When we get back, we're going to confront my own fear

00:20:40.660 of talking about and dealing with money.

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00:23:47.280 We are back with Farnoosh Tarabi, personal finance expert and the author of the new book,

00:23:57.540 A Healthy State of Panic. I do have a confession to make before we chat with Farnoosh some more.

00:24:03.220 I don't like talking about money. I'm afraid of talking about what to do with my money.

00:24:08.720 I'm afraid of talking about whether my family will have enough in the future. But what is

00:24:13.860 enough exactly. And when it comes to my own money, I'm essentially a Sicilian grandmother who would

00:24:19.460 stick money under a mattress or bury it under the barn if I could. And I know that's probably

00:24:25.080 not the right move. And being terrified isn't the answer either, which is why I wanted to talk to

00:24:30.580 Farnoosh about my actual fears. What is a healthy state of panic? What is the balance between the

00:24:37.900 good panic and the shitty panic that makes you not be able to get out of bed in the morning?

00:24:43.860 Right. Well, we are so conditioned to see fear as a bad emotion that we've been hardwired and we've been conditioned to, when we experience fear, when we feel fear, to assume immediately that something is wrong with us and that this emotion has no place in our lives.

00:25:05.060 And so what do we do? We hide. We run away. We try to fight it. We try to do all these things to try to get it out of our lives. And in my experience, any emotion that you try to shove down or attack only ends up coming back and sometimes in a bigger way.

00:25:21.240 So that's not the healthy panic.

00:25:23.780 And that is a lot of how people typically relate to fear.

00:25:28.680 So this book is about what if when the next time fear shows up, you don't actually do

00:25:34.900 anything.

00:25:35.660 You might have a neutral relationship with fear.

00:25:38.980 I want us to get to maybe the next step, which is actually an appreciative relationship with

00:25:42.600 fear.

00:25:42.920 But let's just say you don't do anything and you say, okay, fear is here.

00:25:47.340 It probably has something to teach me.

00:25:49.720 it has shown up for a reason. This is all very rational because fear, that's what it does. It

00:25:55.820 shows up for a reason. And this isn't a new phenomenon. This has been the case since the

00:26:00.080 beginning of time. You and I would not be podcasting here if it hadn't been for fear. It protects us.

00:26:05.120 Right. And so to have a conversation with fear is the first step in having a healthier relationship

00:26:10.700 with this panic and this fear. You and I are very good at asking questions. So the book though,

00:26:15.840 doesn't assume everybody is and gives everybody prompts to what to ask fear when it shows up.

00:26:21.680 And specifically, I go through nine different fears because I don't think that it's also right

00:26:27.920 to just talk about fear as this monolith. I think that in any realm of life, when you can distill

00:26:34.660 something and give it a name, it becomes much more tangible and approachable. So I talk about

00:26:39.920 The fear of rejection, the fear of loneliness, the fear of missing out, FOMO, the fear of

00:26:45.320 uncertainty, the fear of exposure, the fear of money, the fear of failure, the fear of

00:26:49.240 endings, which is a really, really hard chapter to write.

00:26:53.000 And then the last chapter is the fear of losing your freedom.

00:26:55.560 I picked these fears because I think we've all been very familiar with them throughout

00:27:00.700 our lives.

00:27:01.500 They show up constantly.

00:27:03.080 They're the juggernaut fears.

00:27:04.960 And I've also personally navigated through them.

00:27:09.920 And because this book is not exactly a money book,

00:27:13.540 but the fear of money is central to the book.

00:27:16.220 I feel like all these other fears sort of also show up

00:27:19.100 when we're afraid of money.

00:27:20.300 We're also afraid of uncertainty.

00:27:21.700 We're also afraid of failure.

00:27:22.900 We're afraid of losing our freedom.

00:27:24.560 So it was kind of like these were the,

00:27:27.680 they're all within a similar ecosystem

00:27:29.680 and fears don't show up in silos.

00:27:33.240 Like this is not to say that when you're fearing uncertainty,

00:27:36.120 you're not fearing anything else,

00:27:37.680 but I made a,

00:27:39.920 I mean, it's my job as I'm writing the book to give each fear a very distinct look and feel and explanation.

00:27:48.880 And also, I want to say to everybody that when you feel fear, it's completely understandable.

00:27:57.000 You know, like that too, that acceptance is also the healthy way to work with your fears.

00:28:03.220 When you ask fear questions, and I have all the prompts in the book, you learn things about yourself,

00:28:09.340 what you want to protect, your values, where the fear may have come from. That information is gold.

00:28:15.700 It's absolute gold. I say when fear shows up, it's almost like a mirror. It's showing you who

00:28:20.200 you are and what you care about. Like you told me earlier in the podcast, I'm afraid of, what would

00:28:25.140 you say that my book coming out, my next book coming out, The Sicilian. The Sicilian Inheritance,

00:28:31.720 which is a lot about money. The Sicilian Inheritance. It's also, it's a lot about money

00:28:36.160 fears about a woman who loses her business and is terrified that she can't support herself and

00:28:43.660 her daughter. I feel like I combined all of my middle-aged money fears into a delicious

00:28:49.780 adventure with a lot of Sicilian food. I'm there for it. I'm so there. I'm pre-ordering

00:28:58.100 several copies. But you said you're afraid of that book coming out in the world. And I think

00:29:03.060 that that's so honest. And what it's really saying is that you care so deeply about this book's

00:29:09.760 success. Your fear is inextricably connected to your desire for this book to be successful. And

00:29:19.260 of course, you would want that for your book. So let's go there. Let's talk about how you can

00:29:25.440 protect this book from allowing this book, rather, to have the entry into the world that you want it

00:29:33.840 to have. And as we know, as authors, there's a lot that you cannot control, but there's a lot

00:29:37.320 that you can. And I've seen you already do it. You're telling your audience about the book and

00:29:41.280 not being afraid or shameful of that, which it may seem so easy to the ear, like, oh, Jo's just

00:29:46.720 talking about her book again. But I'll have everyone know, like, there's a lot of, especially

00:29:50.920 as women authors and honestly, as women business owners, we are hesitant to talk up our offerings

00:29:58.480 because, and you can talk to Elise Lonan about this, who wrote about, um, all of the seven

00:30:07.440 deadly sins and how women have been sort of targeted, um, around these sins. And like,

00:30:12.940 it's never been acceptable for a woman to want for things because it's considered greedy or 0.78

00:30:18.700 gluttonous. Yes. And so to want for your business to be successful, to want for your book to sell, 0.65

00:30:24.700 to want to make money, that's not considered feminine or right as a woman. So I applaud you.

00:30:32.240 Anyway, I'll just say I applaud you and that that is you taking control of the situation to protect

00:30:37.480 your book and that you got there because you recognize that you have a fear around this and

00:30:43.180 fear is going to get you to do what you can. It does. It does. And I love, I love Elise Lonan

00:30:49.240 and I, it's true when women promote ourselves, I think we're often seen as greedy or pushy.

00:30:59.400 And I think about that a lot, not liked, not liked. And I actually watched this clip

00:31:06.900 of Arnold Schwarzenegger on on the Instagram I think he was on Tim Ferriss I mean just like

00:31:13.300 two dudes talking to each other but uh he was he was on a podcast with another guy

00:31:18.600 and his book his book just came out and he was saying what he was saying was actually awesome

00:31:25.040 he was saying that in the 80s and 90s it wasn't cool for movie stars to sell themselves to sell

00:31:31.480 their products and he never felt that way because he felt really lucky to get to do what he was

00:31:38.540 doing and so he would do whatever it took to sell his movies or his products and to put himself out

00:31:44.420 there and he said that made him seem very uncool to the hollywood elite but if you if you want to

00:31:52.340 get the creative things that you've made that you care so much about into the world you have to sell

00:31:58.740 you have to sell like Arnold. Yeah, there's definitely within the artist community and

00:32:04.840 also the entrepreneur community. And I'm interested that he's saying that as a man,

00:32:09.160 that he felt that way. I think that's interesting because I always think that it's mostly the women 1.00

00:32:14.560 who get the backlash. But interesting that like a muscular man like Arnold could also

00:32:18.940 be poo-pooed on for selling. I'm not a business person. My expertise is in creating. It's not

00:32:24.980 in selling. And it's like, as an author, I will say like, I'm not a, I don't consider myself an

00:32:30.080 artist, but as a creator of, of content and books, I say, I think that, gosh, you know, books don't

00:32:37.740 take, they take a long time to write, like three years. And it's not just time. It's, it's not your

00:32:42.900 time. It's time away from your family. It's, it's a lot of sacrifices, a lot of trade-offs. So I

00:32:47.960 always remember that when I'm, if there's even a part of me that's like, maybe you shouldn't like

00:32:52.620 talk up your book again. It's like, no, because this is part of the success. This is, the success

00:32:58.960 is not just done when you write the book. Like if you, and why wouldn't I want, I mean, I'm proud

00:33:03.680 of my book. You know, I'm proud of my work. I want people to experience it. Like why else did I write

00:33:09.080 it? And we live in an extremely scattered world and extremely, you know, sort of like there's so

00:33:18.480 many. I think I read like you have to promote something seven times to one person for them to

00:33:24.500 remember it and like realize that it's a thing. It's true. It's true. You really do have to talk 0.97

00:33:31.600 yourself up. And it's not a skill that I naturally have. It's one that I've honed and figured out

00:33:37.260 how to have, but I'm still not comfortable with it. Yeah. Well, speaking of not being comfortable,

00:33:47.040 but doing things a friend of mine alex carter who wrote alexandra carter who wrote the book

00:33:52.780 ask for more she said if you're not afraid when you're asking for more money and i think this

00:33:59.960 also relates to like promoting yourself if you're not afraid you're not doing it right

00:34:04.380 you know if you're doing it because if you're so comfortable if you're if it comes so naturally to

00:34:10.800 you you think you have no worries like if i'm going to ask for a raise and i'm like so confident

00:34:14.720 it probably means that I'm low-balling myself, you know, because I'm, especially because as a

00:34:20.660 woman, I think we undersell ourselves in the workplace. We undervalue our contributions in

00:34:26.800 the workplace because the workplace has historically undervalued us. So we're just going with the

00:34:32.100 current. But she says that when you're coming up with that number, you know, not to, it should be

00:34:39.640 rooted in some data and some research, but to push the envelope. And if it makes you scared,

00:34:45.680 that's okay. That's actually a sign that maybe you're warmer to getting the amount that you're

00:34:50.540 entitled to. Huh. I love that. More on the money. More on the money. I mean, think about it. Like

00:34:59.560 if I'm going to, I have a coaching program and I, it's the first cohort I charge what I thought would

00:35:06.540 definitely fill the group. And it did because I didn't price it super high. I didn't even price

00:35:12.700 it more than competitors because I wanted to, it was my first cohort. I really wanted to

00:35:17.720 do a great job, get great results, get everyone being happy, then use those testimonials for the

00:35:23.620 next one and raise the prices, which I will. But I'm a little scared to do it, but I think

00:35:31.240 I have now a foundation to be able to do that. I have road tested results. I have

00:35:38.420 many clients who are happy. I have their testimonials. Um, and it's going to be even

00:35:44.480 better the second time because you learn a lot the first time about what works and what doesn't.

00:35:48.940 So I think that again, like ask for more, be scared, but also remember that you have probably

00:35:56.100 a lot more credit to that ask than you're giving yourself credit for time for a quick break be right

00:36:02.680 back so you were just on the today show and i want to i want to tell you how fabulous you looked

00:36:20.180 on the today show thank you thank you what what advice were you giving out on the today show

00:36:25.960 right so you know it wasn't your typical book segment they did give a shout out to the book

00:36:32.680 in the beginning and then we focused on money myths as part of the education of the segment

00:36:37.760 which I would have preferred if they had called it money money fears or financial fears but we

00:36:44.880 I was able to weave it back into the book because I think that money myths are sometimes the sort

00:36:51.440 of lies that we carry with us into our financial lives because we are afraid. Because we're afraid

00:36:57.640 of disappointing people. We're afraid of doing things that aren't status quo. We're afraid of

00:37:02.520 facing our own potential. And so we talked about myths like the fear, or actually the myth of

00:37:08.180 financial overwhelm, like money's too overwhelming. I'll never learn it. I'm not smart enough. I don't

00:37:13.960 have time. And it's like, you know, that sometimes is something that we pick up as kids, as young

00:37:20.260 adults in a world where there is no financial literacy and there's a huge system, AKA the

00:37:27.440 financial world system that's telling you, you need to just pay us to make this easy for you.

00:37:34.980 And, you know, I said on the air, I said, if anyone is telling you that you can't do this,

00:37:39.800 they're probably trying to sell you something. So let's just end that myth. And I said, at the

00:37:45.460 end of the day, managing your money well, very basically. It comes down to living within your

00:37:51.680 means, paying off your debt responsibly, investing. We can get into it more, but it's not

00:37:58.080 complicated. I get that it takes time and we all have busy lives, but there are many resources that

00:38:05.120 can help you. There's free resources. There's technology. We talked about, for example,

00:38:09.060 this really pervasive myth of self-worth equaling net worth, which is, you know, also fear-driven

00:38:17.700 because I think it really speaks to our fears of facing what we're capable of. And, you know,

00:38:24.600 we are a culture, again, that glorifies the wealthy and the rich as being smarter, harder

00:38:32.960 working. But what we don't remember is that so much of what factors into someone being rich

00:38:39.880 is privilege and luck. And when you remember that, maybe you won't be so hard on yourself

00:38:47.460 when you look at your bank account that it's not just pulling yourself up by your bootstraps,

00:38:52.500 right? Sometimes it's about who you are as a person, the family you were raised in,

00:38:57.780 you know, like all the privileges that you've had. And this is a very troubling myth because

00:39:05.160 again, it prevents us from ever feeling like we can do it. Like we're just never going to get

00:39:11.040 behind ahead of the financial eight ball. And so we talked about these myths, but I tried to kind

00:39:15.740 of bring it back to these like fears too, that we experience and myths and fears are two peas in a

00:39:20.380 pod and it was great we hopefully we'll do another segment again soon but um quite a privilege to be

00:39:29.180 on the today show to launch a book i know so pretty special pretty special pretty special

00:39:35.000 like i did i think it's a big deal to never lose sight of those like things that are very exciting

00:39:40.360 right i will always think it's exciting that someone wants me to be on the television my

00:39:46.580 kids do not think it is exciting at all they i was i did a local news segment the other day with

00:39:51.640 my friend nydia han who is an anchor here at 6abc my kids saw it and i was like look at that isn't

00:39:58.800 that cool and they're like oh it's just you and miss nydia again talking about talking about stuff

00:40:06.060 that's how old are your kids now oh my god i'm so in the thick of it they are six four and ten

00:40:12.700 months oh my gosh joe yeah six and four and then to add a 10 month old whoa i know all of it is

00:40:21.380 hard so we have to take our small wins and we have to be we have to just enjoy it we have to enjoy

00:40:26.140 the ride because it's also going to be a short i mean it's the days are long right they say but

00:40:31.960 the years are short that's true but it's also long right now college is really far away college is

00:40:40.200 I mean, it's not like we'll be able to afford college anyway, because it's going to.

00:40:44.880 I hope you do, because you're going to be living with them for a long time.

00:40:48.260 That's not their picture.

00:40:50.300 But no, I think that for our kids, hopefully what I hope for them is that when they get to that age of like teenage era of like deciding on college that it doesn't like I'm saving for their college.

00:41:02.600 But I'm open to that conversation of like, I think I want to do something different.

00:41:08.400 and yeah yeah i i agree i have so many thoughts on college how i can i ask you a really personal

00:41:17.920 question how are you saving for their college now like what do you what do you do i have a

00:41:24.720 one of those 529s the the the tax college savings plans right savings plans for what there's one

00:41:31.880 for each of them and that's what i have that's what we do well okay that's it yeah we've been

00:41:37.040 saving we saved since they were born actually a little bit before they were born my son we started

00:41:42.740 a little bit earlier because we because you can did you know that like if you don't have if you

00:41:46.700 know you want to have kids or you have a kid on the way and you want to just get a head start you

00:41:49.800 can open up that five to nine and then you just you make it for yourself and then you change the

00:41:54.280 beneficiary to your kid once they're born and we were contributing like 500 bucks a month for each

00:42:00.480 kid and my son who is nine now has like a hundred thousand dollars saved from that five hundred

00:42:07.480 dollars a month that we've been doing consistently and you know sometimes grandparents contribute and

00:42:11.840 um that'll pay for like a semester i think uh i think that's that's that that is that is the

00:42:20.380 thing my friend so yeah we have a way to go same same and we we set them up when all three kids

00:42:27.560 were babies. And $100,000 is a lot of money. It's so much. You should feel amazing that that's

00:42:36.520 already saved and he's nine years old. And it would have covered every single expense when we

00:42:42.700 went to college. Oh, yeah. It would have been a very fun college experience. I think we would

00:42:48.520 have had a lot to eat and nice apartments. Yes. We wouldn't have had to buy used books. It would

00:42:56.060 have been great. Yes. Like it would have been all in and tuition was expensive when, when we went

00:43:02.500 to college, but it was, it did not feel untenable for like, it was a stretch, but it was not soul

00:43:10.580 crushing. And I want to, I want to preface that when we first decided how much to contribute to

00:43:17.180 this 529, we were of the philosophy that this should cover if all goes well and it goes to

00:43:25.380 the charts. This should cover at least a state college tuition. And we also accounted for the

00:43:31.160 annual eight, nine, 10% increase every year that we're seeing crazily enough in college tuition

00:43:36.940 prices at the state level. My husband and I both went to Penn State. We're like, if they want to

00:43:40.340 go to Penn State, then this should be enough. But if they want to go to a fancy private school

00:43:47.960 and it's double, then they need to take out loans and grants and maybe find other ways to,

00:43:54.340 because you know i think college is important and i want to support our kids but i don't

00:43:59.680 think that they should never have skin in the game and if there's a college they really really

00:44:05.340 really want to go to but they're fifty thousand dollars short then they're gonna have to work for

00:44:09.180 that yes yes a hundred percent a hundred percent i totally the groundwork and then you know and

00:44:16.300 then if they get a full scholarship then i'm taking all their money i ask everyone this at

00:44:20.740 the end of the episode what is one thing that you are enjoying being influenced by right now

00:44:26.740 and it doesn't have to be an influencer it can just be i really like this book or this tv show

00:44:31.560 let me think about it i follow feelgoodfoodie on instagram i've uh umna jawad she's a mom of two

00:44:42.780 and pre-pandemic i think maybe it was at the beginning of the pandemic i discovered her at

00:44:48.300 least at the beginning of the pandemic when I was desperate for easy recipes. And she is Middle

00:44:53.720 Eastern like I am and just creates these really simple but technically very correct videos on

00:45:01.780 recipes that are healthy but delicious. And she's just cool. And I like her and I've had her on my

00:45:08.960 podcast. We've become friendly over the years. And like literally the other night, I was on

00:45:16.000 instagram and she's showing me how to make these two ingredient muffins that includes bananas and

00:45:20.620 oatmeal and i just dropped everything i made them at like 11 p.m at night and she does that she makes

00:45:26.700 me do that i just followed her she's excellent yes okay okay now i want to make those were they

00:45:32.780 everything she makes they're delicious she's a good one i think she's like really because we've

00:45:38.040 actually she should come on your show because we taught when we came on when she came on so money 0.99

00:45:41.700 we talked about the influencer deals that she does and does not participate in how she draws 1.00

00:45:46.740 a line things like lucrative deals that she's passed on and she's not in it for the brand deals 0.91

00:45:52.800 you know she's happy to do them when they make sense but she's successful in her own right and

00:45:59.180 she has an audience and a blog and that makes money so um she can be very selective about who

00:46:06.560 she works with as she should i hope we all can be there you know be selective all right we are

00:46:11.720 gonna say goodbye tell everyone where they can find you and where they can have where they can

00:46:14.820 buy your wonderful book a healthy state of panic thank you joe well you can find the book everywhere

00:46:19.180 books are available i also have a website dedicated to it at a healthy state of panic.com

00:46:24.200 my podcast so money is three days three days a week monday wednesday fridays and i love hanging

00:46:29.780 out in the dms on instagram if you've got a question for me about money you want to say hi

00:46:36.400 I'm there usually, much to my husband's chagrin.

00:46:39.820 I'm like on there a lot.

00:46:41.740 And it's because I'm having fun.

00:46:43.880 You guys are really fun.

00:46:45.600 That's all we've got for today.

00:46:47.320 Buy Farnoosh's book, A Healthy State of Panic.

00:46:49.900 Contribute to your kid's college fund.

00:46:51.920 Don't follow most of the financial gurus on the social media.

00:46:55.420 There are people in the real world that you should probably be talking to about money.

00:46:59.780 And in fact, there are certain things that I think we should be getting in the real world.

00:47:03.100 medical advice, money advice, probably pet grooming or something like that. You know,

00:47:10.820 you know the things. Go have a great rest of your day. You deserve it.

Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - November 13, 2023

Fear and Finance with Farnoosh Torabi

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