The Money Talk

The Money Talk | DadSquadCast Episode 3

Nobody teaches dads how to talk to their kids about money — so three fathers who learned the hard way are breaking it down. In this episode of DadSquadCast, co-founders Jeff Randall Allen, Jon Wolheim, and Jordan Egbert get radically honest about credit card debt, scarcity mindsets, creator economics, and what "enough" actually means for their families.

Jeff Randall Allen, Beast Games Season 1 winner of 10 million dollars, leads the conversation with a deceptively simple question: when your kid asks for $10 and the world knows you just won $10 million, what do you say? Jeff walks through his 25-year journey from reckless spender to disciplined investor, the role his wife Jen played in transforming his relationship with money, and why he draws a hard line between saving, investing, and speculating — especially in an era of FanDuel and Polymarket. His framework: you can't keep what you don't earn, and sometimes you earn it in arrears.

Jordan Egbert, luxury travel expert and world-schooling father who has visited over 142 countries with his family, shares how growing up fourth of nine kids made him entrepreneurial from childhood — painting house numbers on curbs for $25 a pop. Jordan breaks down the creator economy from the inside, including the three-step path he teaches aspiring creators: study a thousand hours, execute for a full year before judging results, and never quit your day job until the side income replaces it. His perspective on wealth is rooted in freedom over accumulation — the most liberated he and Chloe ever felt was living out of a suitcase with nothing to come back to.

Jon Wolheim, AI leadership expert and former Apple and Amazon executive who brought two $2B+ AI Unicorns to market, unpacks corporate wealth strategy through the lens of equity, risk matrices, and startup economics. Drawing from nearly a decade at Apple and high-growth roles at Amazon, Jon explains the risk-reward curve of startup equity versus big-tech stability — and why the smartest couples position one partner higher and one lower on that spectrum. Jon also previews an upcoming AI-powered career strategy mapping tool that helps fathers calculate their target number, plot their risk position alongside their spouse, and triangulate what they need to do now to reach financial freedom.

The episode closes with a tactical deep dive into the actual words these dads use with their children about money — from Jordan's reframing of "we can't afford that" to "that's not in our plan right now," to Jeff's philosophy of earning your blessings before or after they arrive, to Jon's systems-based approach using AI to inventory what you own versus what you need.

DadSquadCast — Brotherhood | Mission | Legacy

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:13

So I won$10 million on a TV show, and then my kid asked me for$10 to buy some Pokemon cards. And right there I'm like, do I give it to him? Do I make them earn it? Do I explain what$10 million really means to a kid who thinks$100 is like infinite money? So$10, Pokemon. Like that's when I realized like nobody teaches you how to talk to your kids about money. I certainly wasn't talked to or thought about money when I was younger. Um, and money can be complicated. And I think my situation shares that so completely with my son with a rare disease. I'm not going to tell you what I did yet. Um I'd love to hear from you, John. Like, did anybody ever teach you about money growing up?

SPEAKER_03 0:53

Not really, but I wish that in 1999 they would have told me to spend$10 on Pokemon cards because a Charizard or two would essentially be a Bitcoin, which would be pretty sweet.

SPEAKER_01 1:05

Maybe you, John.

SPEAKER_03 1:06

You would probably have in a case, probably PSA 10. That's right. We'd be we'd be on whatnot doing some sort of live streaming, auctioning off our illustrator Pikachu's. Jeff, that's a such a great question. You know, how how we learn about how our parents talk about money, how how we're socialized into thinking about money and eventually thinking about wealth. I mean, it's such a it feels like such an inside game, right? Like if you didn't learn about it early enough, then maybe you missed the boat. That's certainly how I felt growing up. My I I grew up in a small rural town called Paradise, California. There were not a lot of folks and even fewer dollars to go around. And so my parents were always aspirational, a lot of get rich quick schemes and always thoughts around getting a better life. And for a dad who was born in 1937 and who saw the Great Depression and who lived through wars, it was it was definitely a scarcity mindset that translated to me certainly early on. So no, the answer is no. I did not really learn about how money worked until I was on the wrong side of a couple thousand dollars of credit card debt when I was 20 years old, which felt insurmountable at the time, but it was certainly a powerful learning lesson. 17.9% APR will certainly teach you a lesson or two.

SPEAKER_00 2:16

So, John, how did that happen? How did you, you know, rack up the credit card debt and what did you do to get out of it? Oh man, you guys are gonna love this.

SPEAKER_03 2:24

Do you remember back in like the late 90s? It was in magazines, there were these these services where you could buy 10 CDs for$10. VMG, bam, VMG, exactly right. Boy, they're they're very, very clever. And I just really wanted, I can't even remember what it was. It was probably like a shaggy CD, or like, wow, that's music 12 or something like that. I think they're on 49 now. But it was probably like some weird Jameer Kwai Spice Girls mix that no one should ever have. Zbop, exactly. But yeah, that was um, that was the the kind of decisions that you make when you don't understand what the kind of financial commitments look like at that age. And it was to dive you know a little bit deeper into that, coming from uh a childhood where my my dad was a trucker, and there was a lot of really wonderful parts of that where we got to see, I got to see every single one of the contiguous 48 states before I was 10 years old, which isn't incredible. And I got to learn a worldview that I would never have had otherwise without talking to people in their homes, household goods mover every single day. But that did come at a cost, a lot of costs. And largely that was financial education. We even at times were what I thought taking long vacations, um, it was actually when we were between homes. And that was, again, a powerful teacher. Scarcity and pain can be a powerful teacher. Same money can't give you happiness, but it can certainly cure a lot of unhappiness in some cases. Um, it certainly gets from security. Jordan, let me throw it over to you. Did you find that your financial upbringing uh informed your perspective even now as a parent?

SPEAKER_00 3:53

Yeah. So I grew up in a little bit of a unique situation where I have nine total people in my family. So eight other siblings. And so even though you know my father had a good job, it always felt like money was tight because, you know, there's so many different kids with sports activities and everything going on. And so the blessing of that is I learned at an early age that I was gonna have to figure it out for myself, right? If I wanted to be really successful in life, and so at a young age, I was very business-minded and entrepreneurial. I was putting up lemonade stands on the weekends. I was one of the funnier jobs I took on as a kid was I was painting curb, the the address of someone's house on their curb in front of the house, and I was charging 25 bucks for that, and they looked horrible, but I think people felt bad for me, and so they let me paint their curbs for them.

SPEAKER_02 4:45

But but yeah. Where where did you fall in line? So I was number four. Where in the nine were you? Okay. So right in the middle, smack dad. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 4:54

You know, Jordan, I've noticed and and I share with you an early entrepreneurial bend that I also attribute to hey, if if I don't make this this money, if I don't create some sort of uh fun fund in my case, it's not gonna be there. In my case, it was buying candy at the Safeway in town and then selling it on the bus, which is how I bought my first Mario Kart S N E S cartridge, uh, which I still have to this day, by the way. Paid for with almond joys and Reese's peanut butter cups. That's awesome. Jeff, let's go back to that that um sum of money that you mentioned, which uh is probably piquing more some curiosity out there.$10 million, right? That's a tremendous amount of infused capital. How did your mindset around wealth change after that infusion happened?

SPEAKER_01 5:38

Yeah, uh well, and it's like$10 million is a lot. It's even more so when you get it all at once. It was not like that, you know,$10 million accrued over a handful of years in investments. But uh my, you know, my mindset on money changed probably when I when I shared my finances with my wife when we were girl uh boyfriend and girlfriend. Um she she was the first person to really teach me about money. And she's you know, her parents were immigrants, you know, she knew how to stretch a dollar and how to save. Like she was like looking looking at my spend and going, what are you doing? Where are you spending this money? Like, uh, you know, I was living in California, I was paying for a membership at, you know, somewhere in Ohio and I hadn't lived there for nine months. And so she she just a lot she taught me how to um get a hold of my spend. And then I, you know, I think for me is like I started to kind of think about saving versus investing versus speculating. And so, you know, I I was I was on a good track. Like I felt like I was prepared to receive$10 million. But when it comes to it, you're like, oh my gosh, what do I do? And you know, I I think for us, like, you know, and for most people, it sounded like a huge amount of money in my head. And, you know, don't get me wrong, it is, but it didn't flip a switch. You know, like we still live in the same home, we still drive the same cars. It just kind of allows you the tools to kind of focus on your values. And for us, it's like, how do we take care of Lucas? He's got the rare disease, and how do we make sure our family's taken care of? And so it just kind of puts us into action mode to put things into place, make sure we have a good team around us, and uh make sure we're putting to good use, not only for today, for next year, but for 10, 20, 30 years down the line. And um, yeah, I I I am so lucky. I didn't, I didn't, I did not start dating her for her for her money coaching, for her, for her Dave Ramsey qualities, but damn, I am so happy she had them. Will you be my CPA? Yes. I mean, it's it's uh, you know, and I think it's just another good reminder to be vulnerable in relationships. It's like like I was so embarrassed to kind of share with her my credit card statements or bank statements. And she, without judgment, she goes, okay, like don't go call me out on some stupid stuff, but like, hey, let's fix this. I got on a budget. This was back in my early 30s, and got I was making good money, but I was spending every dollar. And so, you know, again, uh, this is one of the most valuable lessons I've ever learned and that I'm trying to impart into Jack is the difference between saving and investing and the difference between investing and speculating. And especially in today's day and age where you see FanDuel and polymarket, things that kind of are very speculative. People are trying to get rich quick and speculate their way into wealth. Can it be done? I'm sure it has been done. Is it likely that you're gonna do it? Probably not. So for me, it's learning first save, then invest, and then speculate.

SPEAKER_03 8:27

Did you know that one of the most common professions among millionaires per capita for their profession is teachers in the United States, which notoriously undercompensated group of people, right? Like it's just a fabric of our society. We should probably pay them better. There's this through line of discipline that might be a similar flavor to what we're talking about here, which is hard-earned grit and a level of spend thriftiness that empowers that mindset of investment and not speculation. Jeff, that's boy, you you talk to somebody who plays the options market and you you are talking to somebody who is gambling.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

Yeah, and and there there's people who might do that professionally and they they are good at it. But I'm saying that to try to try to speculate your way into wealth without training, it's hard. Again, I'm speaking from experience. I was a risk taker. I was speculating before I saved, and uh it didn't it didn't usually work out for me. But but the moment I again I started kind of going, okay, I have six months of savings to make sure it worst case scenario, I can pay my rent and pay my bills. That takes a I mean, I felt like I lost 10 pounds. And then you start investing, you kind of go, wait, I put money in, and the next year there's like 10% more, and the next year there's 12% more. Like, oh, this is compound interest. This is pretty cool. And then speculating, once you have money that you kind of go, yes, I will set aside 5% or 10% to something that's super risky but could have a high reward, you got to be willing to lose it and not get upset about it. So it it took, it was a it was an absolute journey for me. I'm talking about this is a 25-year journey for me to sit here and kind of go, I understand how money works and how I can use it, put it to use, invest it, and not be attached to it.

SPEAKER_03 10:09

Jordan, the um you inhabit of career, a life path that is often identified as the one that the most kids, right now, seniors in high school, are saying they want to do. And that's to be a creator, to have the freedom and the risk that comes with that world. How has being a creator changed your mindset around wealth?

SPEAKER_00 10:30

Yeah, I love that question because I get asked all the time from, you know, my parents, friends, or or people of the older generation that are like, how are you making money? Right? People just don't understand it. And so it's something I didn't understand either going into it. It all stemmed from have you guys seen the color code personality test before, where there's four colors that correspond with personality traits. So red is like very disciplined and leadership focused, blue is very focused on relationship building, white is very focused on you know making peace, and then yellow is all about having fun and being spontaneous. Well, I was like 96% yellow in high school and college. And so the only thing that motivated me was having fun, right? And so I I tried to I tried to put myself in this box of, you know, I need to go have a stable career, I need to make money the traditional way. And it just wasn't for me, right? And I wanted to do what I wanted to do. And so when I first started traveling and making content, I actually never thought that it would become a full-time job for me. I just did it because I wanted to do it. The way I was looking at it was like a gap year, right? Where like, hey, I'll I'll sell everything I own, I'll save up as much money as I can, and then I'm very irresponsibly gonna go travel the world for as long as I can until my money runs out and then come back and make more money and do it again, right? It was a terrible game plan going into it. But what it turned into is that yes, you can actually make money as a content creator. And you know had I known how to do that or a few tips and tricks going into it, it would have made it a lot easier. So, number one, first and foremost, for anybody who wants to become a YouTuber or content creation, I always tell them if you have a steady job and you're earning income, don't quit right away. Right? You have more time where you can, you know, still work and still have a steady income, but do everything else to build your content creation career on the side. So if you work nine to five, well, guess what? You have from five to nine every day to make content, to film videos, to edit. And, you know, that's a good chunk of your week that you can start. And the same goes with owning a business as well, starting a business. You have time in the day. You just have to grind, you have to hustle to start your business. And, you know, because it takes so long to make any money from being a content creator. It's like anything else, right? You have to have eyeballs on it, you have to have loyal people watching it, you have to have good content, and that takes time to build. So it's something that is very rewarding once you are making consistent income from it, but it does take a decent amount of time to build. So yeah, does that make sense? Very much so.

SPEAKER_03 13:22

And I think that's gonna resonate with uh a lot of folks who are maybe watching this right now asking, should I chase that particular dream and what could happen? That's a a tremendously valuable perspective, Jordan, especially the um the stability piece, right? It's not all or nothing. You you don't have to push all your chips onto one box and and hope for eight. I make that joke because these are two Vegas natives that I'm on here with. So hopefully that hopefully that landed. I think that's also true in couples. You know, going back, Jeff, to your point of what it's like to be laid bare financially, once that once you cross that bridge and there's that level of trust, which is really critical to maintain, by the way. I will say that having worked in HR for many, many years and having had perspectives into what impacts people's lives in many cases, finances are the number one thing that damages relationships. And being clear, transparent, honest about your own behaviors is probably the single most important one I would add to that, because then that empowers the next piece, which is there's this emerging trend I'm noticing on socials. And who knows, maybe this is like the worst idea ever. But I'm hearing a lot of hey, if you if you're gonna have somebody that's gonna try to go down the creator route or to be an entrepreneur in an untested field, and we're not talking about buying a laundromat or a car wash, we're talking about becoming a creator, a streaming, being a Twitch star, like these things. Having one person who's got the stability, the healthcare benefits, the retirement that's just still coming in, while the other person kind of goes and explores the moonshot. That seems like the the modern day approach to this because it really does seem like no matter what the idea is, we all are kind of like throwing darts at a dartboard. And like sometimes you get lucky and you you hit a bullseye. But let's let's call that 1% of the time, you know, which is better odds than one in 2000.

SPEAKER_02 15:11

True.

SPEAKER_03 15:12

But the more capital you have, it seems like the more darts you get to throw, right? And by having the stability, it allows you to get better and to get closer to the bullseye and hopefully hit it. That would be one thing that I've seen that's really common among successful entrepreneurs.

SPEAKER_01 15:24

That's a that's a great point, John. And Jen and I have always kind of had that as like there's a before kids where like we both should be going for it. You know what I mean? And we gotta make sure that like we have jobs, we have insurance, like that stuff was kind of table stakes, but like one of us should be trying something that we want to go for. Then it kind of flipped once Lucas got diagnosed, was like we both can't be going for it at the same time. Like one of us has to have something that's more steady and kind of we can that we can root our family in. So it's uh yeah, it's uh being on the same page with your with your partner, with your family about money and about your goals uh financially are just so important. But like I've been wanting I wanted to ask you this, Jordan, while you were talking, like, because I create content too, and I remember the first time I actually got a check for it. And I was like, oh my gosh, like I really you really get paid for this. You remember how you got your first dollar paid to you from content creation? Who was it from?

SPEAKER_00 16:17

How'd it make you feel? Man, I'll I'll never forget the first time I got paid for content creation. It was such a surreal moment. I was like, someone wants to pay me to go on a trip and talk about their hotel and everything to do. I mean, it was so surreal. But even before that, I wanted to piggyback on your last point quickly, Jeff, where you said, you know, you kind of had one of you in the relationship with a steady career, and then the other one is kind of, you know, taking more risks and throwing darts at the dartboard. I think the biggest mistake I I see people make when starting a business or becoming a creator is just going all in without a plan, right? Quitting their job and be like, hey, I'm gonna be a YouTuber and you know, start making videos, and then they do that for a couple months, and you know, it's not building as fast as they want, and then they're in a really bad spot. So I think the really the three steps to starting a business or becoming a content creator is number one, you have to study a thousand hours, right? Content creators specifically, you need to know the niche that you're getting into, and you need to watch thousands of other videos of people making similar style content, put it in a spreadsheet, find out what's working, what's not working, find out why it's working, and then you need to make similar videos to what's already working and performing well, going viral. And I mean, that's the most proven way to become successful in this career. And so number one is study a lot. Number two is to execute and stick with it, right? So many people try posting their first 10 videos or 30 videos, and they're not getting the view count they want, so they give up. That's like 90% of creators, they don't actually make it because they get burnt out after the first, you know, month, 30 days, 60 days. You really have to give this an entire year if you want to see if it's gonna work or not. And then, you know, from there, it's working when you have the time. So it's not quitting the job yet. It's you know, taking time out of your schedule with whatever you're doing already until you're making enough to replace your current income. And for me, yeah, that first check I got, Jeff, was a hotel in San Diego, and they paid me, I think,$500 and gave me a free stay for two nights to come out and and make content of the hotel. And such a surreal moment for me. And then I also, another big milestone for me was when so I the first job I took out of college, I was doing sales and I was making$40,000 a year. Next big milestone for me in content creation was when I made that same amount of my annual salary from one brand deal on social media. Wow. And I was just that's amazing. Oh my gosh, how is this real life? Right. And so, yeah, crazy, crazy world, but you know, there is a lot of money to go around in in content creation. You just have to stick with it and you know, be diligent.

SPEAKER_03 19:06

And the cool thing is was that your your brand deal with Whiskey Pete's in Vegas? Was that is that that one? I don't know if I've ever even been to Whiskey Pete.

SPEAKER_01 19:14

Well, yeah, I mean, Jordan, you you did mention how it's kind of, you know, don't quit your job. It's nice to have someone to have a steady job and someone else goes for it. John, from your perspective, you've kind of been fortunate to have the best of both worlds. You know, you've worked at very stable companies like Apple and Amazon, but are also hyper growth. Like when you were there, they've exploded since. So it's um kind of love to hear a little bit kind of about your story and from your exposure to some of the the biggest change makers in the world between Steve Jobs and Bezos and Apple and Amazon. How has that shaped how you view money? You view money in your family, how you would talk to your children about money.

SPEAKER_03 19:50

I think for me, especially in technology, in in tech, and and now especially in AI, my thoughts around what wealth means, and let's let's use a term called corporate wealth here. And that largely refers to equity. And that's the money that you make, whether it's real or theoretical, inequity, especially in technology, in the startup environment, x more true in that environment, it's almost always going to be inequity. And there's a there's a matrix where the more risk, the greater the equity play. And the less risk, the less equity a company needs to give you in order to join. And usually there's about a you know, a 10 to 20% flex around that straight line where you can play. And if you can consistently come in on the higher edge of that curve, you can really amass some wealth over the course of your lifetime, meaning uh less risk, greater equity positioning. Um, but that's a different, different episode when we talk about career strategy. But to go to your question, Jeff, when it comes to how my thought process has changed, you know, let's talk about Apple. While I was there for nigh on 10 years, my equity almost tripled, which sounds great, right? Like, wow, tripled in only 10 years. Well, in most startup environments, from one funding round to the next, you're looking at conservatively five to 10x. And that is very common. And that is just how the startup world works. That said, there was never a day when I woke up and said, man, I hope Apple's here tomorrow. That's exactly the perfect description of the risk versus reward. And having a special needs kiddo myself, Jeff, having lived that exact moment where you say, I cannot go out on that limb right now, because if that branch snaps, it's not just me. And I have to be solid on that one. For me, the journey into startup land happened as I was completing my MBA. I went to went back to school much later in life for that particular education leg. And after a big period of growth at Amazon, where even among tremendous growth and valuation for the company during COVID, even that was nothing really compared to the amount of equity appreciation that can happen in a startup environment. Take, for example, a company going through series of funding, right? There's series, typically a seed round, something like a safe round, a series A, B, C. Usually after a C, you're coming up on an IPO. You're looking at something like a 10X each one of those times, possibly more. And that all is, there's a lot of other factors that go into that. But my mindset around wealth and corporate setting is really finding that place where you're comfortable if you're going to work in tech. If you want to go into a startup world, there's five people in a garage somewhere in Cupertino who would love to have your help no matter what you do, even in the era of AI. And you've got about a 0.2% chance that you become a multimillionaire because of that relationship. However, Sergey Brenn, Larry Ellison, most of these people, Steve Jobs, were at one point in the garage. And you have to ask yourself, am I willing to sit in that garage and to absorb that risk? And my my thought process is absolutely aligned with in any relationship, if you can have one person who is higher on the risk matrix and one person who is lower. And so it's not just like, hey, I'm going to work a, you know, government job. I'm going to go work at the DMV for 35 years. And then my partner is going to go, you know, do startup plays forever. It's a little more nuanced than that, where maybe somebody's in a stable role in a bigger company with very proven benefits and exactly what you need in the way of retirement. And then somebody else is higher on that risk matrix. And they're perhaps in a earlier phase company, maybe one that's about to IPO. And so there's a chance at 10xing equity. Again, a equity topic is a big one and probably good for another one. But yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:34

But it's a but it's an interesting one. And I think um, I think even for people who, you know, when you talk about wealth, you know, it's it's hard to get wealthy on like true, like true wealth for me, after$10 million, what$10 million give me is peace of mind. You know, where you know, if if my family needs something, I'm you know, I'm not necessarily thinking twice or looking at the the cost of should I not get this steak? I'll get the steak that's three dollars less. Those aren't things I think about right now. I have peace of mind that Lucas is taking care of, that Jack can go to the college he wants to. That's great. But if you don't have skin in the game, it's gonna be hard to get wealthy enough to where you have peace of mind. You know, and I don't want to speak for anybody else, but for me, it's like living in Silicon Valley, it's expensive. And just doing it on a on a on a W-2 salary, it's hard unless you have the opportunity to have an exit or have I own a piece of this company. So um I just think it's always important to kind of go, if I'm giving this company my all, do I have a stake in it? Am I a part owner? And you know, whether it's 0.01% or it's 0.1%. I think it's uh an interesting thing that people should explore. And I mean, John, I think we definitely should have uh an episode on it, or even a microepisode.

SPEAKER_03 24:48

Yeah, maybe maybe this could be alive. It's incredible too. You know, you you over the course of participating in a in a company where you have even very, very fractional ownership, especially if it's meaningful ownership in an entity. There's a lot of ways that you can you know reach liquidity. And Jeff used the term exit, which means when you functionally cash out, going back to the casino analogy. But yeah, uh, you know, if anybody listening would like to tune in and maybe even do like a live workshop. This could be something that we do in the Discord community. Maybe this is like a free session for everybody. Please drop comments and let us know if that's something that you'd like. And if so, maybe what you'd like to talk about. We can do some strategy.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

That'd be sweet. Well, I mean, I and I kind of touched on it. Like I kind of touched on obviously what I won is public. You know, um, my kids know it, his teachers know it, my neighbors know it. I can't really hide the fact that I won$10 million. And for me, you know, the the question that I just kind of shared is it enough? Does it give me peace of mind? Like uh, I I forget who it was. I think it was uh Morgan Housel who kind of wrote something to the extent of like, you know, modern capitalism is a pro at two things. One is generating wealth, and the other is generating envy. You know, so where, where is uh do you guys have a sense of what that number is that's enough for you without feeling like I need to get this for X reason? I'd love to hear your take, John. Like, what is enough for you?

SPEAKER_03 26:09

I think that's a question that is important to answer as a couple, really structurally. And by that I mean taking a day, a year, a quarter, and really stopping and saying, where do we want to be five, 10, 20 years from now in an era of increasing longevity, meaning if we're all gonna live to be 150 years old or more, these questions bear even greater weight because that number is different. You're not just trying to get to 85 anymore. We are all probably trying to get to 120 or or more. Scary. And so I I think that that that number is it's it's a personal one, it's one that has to be held for people. We we do have that number. One thing I will add to that, though, is knowing that number is an unbelievably powerful data point because then you don't end up on the hamster wheel. If you know that you need to have eight million dollars of net worth in order to move to a rural part of New Zealand and raise sheep, and that's your dream, and that's exactly what it costs, and that gives you right. Yeah, hey, let's actually, let's actually do that, guys. Just fit for a a portion of it, I think. Uh but we but when you know that number and you know what that goal looks like and that's what you're funding, you don't have to constantly feel like I'm supposed to get promoted and and I have to trade time, especially with my kids and my spouse. You know exactly what that time costs and you know exactly when it's time to stop selling it. And I think that that's um I love that you bring that up, Jeff. It's it's one of the most powerful things I think you can know in your heart.

SPEAKER_01 27:36

Yeah, and I mean, and I I love that you have a a structural process to it. You know, so Jordan, have have you and Chloe sat down and spent time like this and kind of going, what is our plan? What does it look like? Why do we want it? Is it something you guys have done? Yeah, just just a hundred million is fine if anyone has it laying around.

SPEAKER_02 27:52

I'll take that. Feast game season 12? What?

SPEAKER_00 28:00

Yeah, I love the question. For me, it's it's been less about a monetary number and more about what I value in terms of freedom, and that's time, right? So my big goal going into starting a business and also becoming a content creator is I want to be able to go and play baseball with my kid at the park at 12 o'clock on a Tuesday if I want to, right? I never want to have to be somewhere. I want to be able to have the ultimate freedom for me is having as much time as I want to be able to do whatever I want. And so while yes, obviously the financial piece of it is very helpful, I value that freedom over anything else.

SPEAKER_03 28:43

Fokan has a true 97% yellow on that on that personality matrix.

SPEAKER_01 28:46

Yeah, exactly. I think obviously you know that in in our in our world, money's a tool that helps you create that freedom more. But I like something that you hit on that is like huge is what you value. And I and I think like John shared that he does this, whether it's a day or a month or over a year, like you figure out your values, like why you want this. And to John's point, if you don't know why you want a certain number, man, you're a you're in for a hamster wheel of hell. And it's uh you know it was it was the just the it was the best work I ever did was values work in my early 30s to kind of figure out really what is important to me, because you can get stuck, you can get stuck climbing this corporate ladder that you don't even want to be on.

SPEAKER_03 29:30

To your point, Jeff, this is the number one reason in my experience where burnout comes from, where people staying in a job that they don't like, maybe even an abusive dynamic where that comes from, where when you don't know whether you can or you can't leave because you don't have that number, that freedom in your mind, it can be really difficult to see the purpose, like why you're enduring that challenge. It the the counterpoint is also true. If you feel super motivated and you know exactly what you're fighting for, you can do an incredible thing. You can move mountains. Well, without that number, I do think in a lot of ways, especially when you're looking at, hey, if I do X job and I get a 15, 20% raise, that puts me X percent closer. Or maybe even in time terms, Jordan, that puts me six months closer to where I'm trying to be. That getting to where you can calculate that. As a precursor, in a very near-term episode, we're going to be talking about AI. And one of the skills that we're going to be working with is in fact a career strategy mapping tool that allows you to plan where you are on that risk index, to map yourself and your spouse, and to think about what that might mean for finance. And heck, why don't we just program in a little bit of a target number over time too? So you can start to triangulate what you need when and what you have to do now.

SPEAKER_01 30:44

I'm excited for that one. Like I I want to see the AI man in motion. So I'll be tuning to that one. Obviously, I'll be here, but I will be I'll be like a spectator that's uh pseudo co-tuning. Uh but I I think one of the unique things is like we we talk about all these things that we're doing. And again, we've kind of self-admittling that we taught ourselves this stuff. You know, that like I learned about money in my 30s, you know. So, you know, as any good father will do, it, you know, our job is to teach our kids the lessons that we've learned the hard way and you know, ensure that they learn them in kind of a similar fashion, but ideally, they learn them earlier. This one's tactical. This one's like like I'm looking for actual conversations that you've had with your children. And again, I know Jordan, I know Atlas is young, I know Lynn's pretty young too, but I want to hear actual conversations that you've had with them about money. Not the philosophy, but the words. Like, what um, what do your kids say when if you buy a new car or you're moving into a new home or you're traveling, did they ask if you're rich? Like, I'd love to hear, Jordan, what what do you what do you tell your kids about money?

SPEAKER_00 31:51

I love that. There's there's two things that I think are really important to me that I pass on to my kids. And one of them is I never want them to feel like we don't have money, right? So I I try and cut out words, you know, if if they ask to buy a toy at the store, for example, I don't ever want to say anything like we can't afford that, or you know, just to bring out that that scarcity mindset instead, you know, it would be, well, that's not in our plan right now, or, you know, something along the lines where it's just shifting the mindset from scarcity to we're choosing not to do that. We're choosing not to buy that instead. And one thing that I've noticed living the unique lifestyle I have of traveling the world is less really is more in terms of material things. And I think it was Socrates who had a quote that said, The people who are at the happiest in life are not the people with the most things. It's the people who learn how to do the most with what they already have. And so I I probably butchered that a little bit, but that's the message of it. Whereas, you know, in life we're always chasing the next big thing, the next big purchase, the boat, the new car, the new house. And something I've observed just traveling the world and for myself as well, it was the most freeing feeling in the world when Chloe and I decided to offload everything, sell everything, and live out of a suitcase. And I'm not suggesting that everyone do that, but we felt weightless, right? We had nothing material to come back to. We could do whatever we wanted. It was the ultimate freedom. And traveling around the world and you know, seeing different cultures, different lifestyles that people live. One of the things that rings true everywhere you go is some of the people who have the least are the happiest. And so the lesson that I like to teach my kids is, you know, a minimalistic lifestyle. So for birthdays, we'll do one or two presents for Christmas. We try and keep the presents at a minimum as well. We want to teach enjoying what you have and not always needing and wanting more. Well, I needed that.

SPEAKER_01 33:59

That was great. I think I'm gonna take some of those tips into my parenting as well. That was uh super well said.

SPEAKER_03 34:06

You know, Jordan, I've got a little bit of a story that that might underline a couple of those points too. So I mentioned I'm from a small town called Paradise, California. Paradise, California, most people who who know about it know about it for one of two reasons. Either your grandma moved there, which was probably the case. The average age in town was 67 years old when I was growing up, or you heard about it because it was the town that essentially was erased by uh what was until recently the most expensive natural disaster in the history of the United States, which was uh the campfire. And it just wiped out the town. And I mean, in the space of about three hours, there was a town and then there wasn't. One in 10 structures was left standing. And so essentially it it forced a lot of people to answer the question what happens when you lose everything? You don't even have this suitcase. And obviously, there's tremendous trauma that comes with that. And most of my family members lost their homes in that in that process. And my dad lost literally everything he owned, other than the truck that he barely got out in. But in speaking with him and others after that, survivors of that fire, many of them spoke to this feeling of release, of freedom, having accumulated all these things, especially in the United States. You know, we tend to index on our trappings representing our worth because it's visual. It's, it's, it's what we are told we need to buy. And when all that stuff is just gone, that old saying, you know, I think it was Fight Club, where the things we own come to own us. And boy, what an amazing uh unshackling. And that is not universally held. I'm not speaking for everyone who endured that unbelievable trauma, but it was amazing to hear isolated instances of stories where people said, while they wouldn't have chosen that, the circumstances did create an environment where they were able to experience a freedom that they probably never would have otherwise. Um and it's a form of joy. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 35:50

Yeah, that's so powerful. And again, just noticed it myself. One point you mentioned, the more you have, the more weight you have to carry. Right. And I think so often we get trapped in this where, you know, we we fill up our houses and then we get a storage unit and start putting stuff in there that we never go and see for years on end. And yeah, I think if there's one takeaway from this point, it's that, you know, anybody can go through all of their stuff and just get rid of as much as possible, things that, you know, don't hold significant value to you. And every everyone that I know that's done that describes it the same way: an incredibly, incredibly freeing feeling, just getting rid of a bunch of stuff, taking the weight off. So yeah, I love that. Thank you for sharing.

SPEAKER_03 36:31

Well, we have reached the apex of our time here today. We have one last segment, which of course it's hot dad's hot takes. Throw, does anyone want to go first? Go hot dad. Here you go. My hot take is is one that is easy to say, but real hard to put in place, but is getting easier, especially with AI. And that is that systems will set you free. If you have a place for everything and everything's in its place, it's harder to end up in this position of we need a storage unit that might end up on storage wars. And it's when you have that rubric, you can even walk around with your phone now and just video everything you have, drop it in the cloud, and it'll tell you a full inventory of your whole house. That's one way that you can say what do we actually have versus what we need. And then going back to how does that connect to what we ultimately, where we want to be. So there's my hot take. Beautiful. Hot dads going next.

SPEAKER_01 37:22

Jeff. All right, Jojo. Okay, I'll I'll I'll my hot take with money is and this is something I try to teach Jack too. You can't keep what you don't earn. Crazy thing is, obviously, like, did I really earn$10 million? Maybe, you know, but I think you can earn stuff in arrears. Like, you know, the cool thing about when you you might work your butt off for 10 years and oh my gosh, you have this amazing windfall from it. You earn it beforehand, or you might get this thing falls in your lap. And my philosophical belief is that you gotta earn it afterward. And so, whatever you get, whatever your blessings are, monetary or not, you can't keep what you don't earn. Jordan, over to Jojo.

SPEAKER_00 38:03

Take us out. Well, my hot take was gonna be less is more, but I feel like I've already covered that. Yeah, just to reiterate the point, I feel like the ultimate freedom is having less amount of material things. So, yeah, that's my hot take.

SPEAKER_01 38:17

I like it a lot. It's uh it's easier said than done in today's day and age, but if you once you practice it and you taste it, it's like live in a smaller house, you have less stuff to furnish.

SPEAKER_00 38:29

Absolutely. Jeff subscription. Jeff, I have one final question for you. So what do you got? We know your ultimate goal with winning the$10 million is to find a cure for Lucas, take care of the family. But everyone wants to know, did you make a big splurge or a big purchase after getting that$10 million wire deposit into the bank account?

SPEAKER_01 38:50

I bought my wife a nice piece of jewelry and I bought myself a 10-year-old car. Those were those were my big purchases. But hey, you know what? I still might make a big purchase in the coming year. I didn't have to do it right away. So stay tuned. Ask me, uh, ask me on episode like 34.

SPEAKER_03 39:06

There we go. Clarity, it was a Lamborghini that took 10 years to hand assemble. Exactly. Just to be clear. It's bright yellow. It's so cool. Well, thank you for the stories, gents. Thank you, listeners, for tuning in, and we'll see you next time for the AI superpower dad. See you next episode.