306: [Doug Lynam] Taming Your Money Monster: Understanding Your Financial Mindset
In this episode of About That Wallet, host Anthony Weaver welcomes Doug Lynam, a former monk turned financial expert, to discuss the profound impact of money traumas and how to overcome them. Doug shares his unique journey from a 20-year monastic life to becoming a money manager, emphasizing the importance of taking responsibility for one's finances. He dives into the psychological aspects of money, exploring how childhood experiences shape our financial behaviors and beliefs.
Listeners will learn about the Enneagram personality types and how they relate to money management, including the common pitfalls and strengths of each type. Doug offers practical tips on fostering open conversations about finances with loved ones and instilling financial literacy in children. He also discusses the significance of prioritizing self-care in financial planning, especially for those in the Sandwich Generation.
💬 Question of the Day: What money traumas have you faced, and how have they influenced your financial decisions? Share your thoughts in the comments!
🔗 Connect with Doug Lynam:
Website: https://www.douglynam.com/
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=|| 📚 Chapters ||=
00:00 - Introduction and Guest Background
2:01 - Becoming a Monk
5:31 - Financial Challenges in the Monastery
10:01 - Money Trauma and Childhood
15:01 - Enneagram and Money Monsters
25:01 - Four Pillars of Finance
30:01 - Communication and Financial Literacy
35:01 - Future Plans and Public Speaking
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⚠️ DISCLAIMER:
This content is for educational purposes only and is not financial advice. Always consult a licensed financial professional when needed.
#AboutThatWallet #MoneyTrauma #FinancialLiteracy #Enneagram #SelfCare
Episode 306
Transcript
This episode is sponsored by Podcast Cola.
Speaker B:What is it?
Speaker B:What are your money traumas?
Speaker B:Where are they coming from?
Speaker B:And how to.
Speaker B:How to.
Speaker B:How to really conquer them?
Speaker B:So that would be my quick tip, my quick take.
Speaker A:No, thank you for the quick take, because that is definitely one of the things that a lot of people don't do.
Speaker A:Welcome everybody back to another exciting show, the about that water podcast, where we help the famous generation build strong financial habits so that they can talk about money, spend money, and enjoy their.
Speaker A:Their money.
Speaker A:I have somebody who has been doing amazing things around the world, in and out of the public service, and actually doing a lot of cool things on a religious side.
Speaker A:So this is actually going to be a cool episode.
Speaker A:But he's also author of Taming your money Monster and from Monk to money Manager.
Speaker A:I'm gonna get that right.
Speaker A:But also, Doug, how you doing today?
Speaker B:Doing great, Anthony.
Speaker B:How are you feeling?
Speaker B:How's your heart?
Speaker A:My heart?
Speaker A:It was actually.
Speaker A:I feel good in my heart today.
Speaker A:Feeling good.
Speaker B:Good.
Speaker A:So one of the things that I really wanted to have you on is because I never had a monk on a show before, and can you just kind of talk about that process?
Speaker B:Yeah, well, I mean, so I'm not a monk currently, but I was a monk for 20 years.
Speaker B:I was in a Benedictine order in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Speaker B:And not everybody can become a monk.
Speaker B:Obviously, you need to be single, and you need to be, you know, free from a lot of worldly attachments if you want to.
Speaker B:You got to let some things go if that's the lifestyle you choose.
Speaker B:And then there's a.
Speaker B:There's sort of an application process, essentially, that takes several years.
Speaker B:You tend to have different stages of your monastic life.
Speaker B:There's a novitiate thing, is called postulancy, novitiate, and then final vows or stages to it to become a fully professed monk.
Speaker B:And that usually takes anywhere from three to seven years, depending on the community.
Speaker B:But I joined when I was 21, right out of 22, right out of college.
Speaker B:I first went to the Marine Corps enough.
Speaker B:And I went to Officer Candidate School, and I graduated top of my class there, and then had a bit of a spiritual awakening and realized that, you know, some unresolved anger issues and high explosives were a bad combination.
Speaker B:And maybe I didn't want to make killing people a living, killing people for a living my career choice.
Speaker B:So I went looking for something else that would give me the same kind of structure and discipline I loved about the Marines and the community, this breed of corps, all the positive sides without maybe so much of the killing.
Speaker A:So it's very hard to say.
Speaker B:And turned out to be a wise decision because I.
Speaker B:The Iraq and Afghanistan war popped up shortly after that.
Speaker B:So I would have inevitably been in those conflicts, which I'm glad to have avoided.
Speaker B:And I'm sorry for everybody who suffered through those.
Speaker B:But then.
Speaker B:Yeah, so 20 years as a monk and then about three years into my.
Speaker B:I kind of joined the monastery for a number of reasons, but, you know, one was to annoy my parents because they were, you know, kind of very materialistic and, you know, living kind of a.
Speaker B:Back in the 80s and 90s, sort of a yuppie lifestyle that I was rebelling, rebelling against.
Speaker B:My.
Speaker B:My brothers and I all.
Speaker B:We all took a vow of poverty in different ways.
Speaker B:You know, I became a monk, my.
Speaker B:I have a twin brother who became a homesteader in upstate Vermont and an older brother who ran off to join a grunge band in Seattle.
Speaker B:So we all kind of pushed away from the materialistic world in different ways and partly rebellion and partly looking for some real spiritual roots, looking for some meaning in our lives and then.
Speaker B:But I also wanted to avoid the world of money materialism.
Speaker B:I really hated money and hated the whole system, and it was very unhealthy in many ways.
Speaker B:But to my shock and ironic twist of fate, the monastery went bankrupt about three years after I got there.
Speaker B:And somebody had to figure that mess out.
Speaker B:And it turned out we all hated dealing with money.
Speaker B:We all had big money issues.
Speaker B:And if everybody in your household or your family or your community or whatever it is, your church, your school, your business, if you all hate dealing with it, it's just not going to go well.
Speaker B:This is something that you cannot escape even in a monastery, which I found out to my shock and surprise.
Speaker B:And so I started digging in and started reading all the books I could in finance and eventually develop some skills.
Speaker B:And it's a much longer story.
Speaker B:I go into it my first book, From Monk to Money Manager.
Speaker B:The subtitle is A Former Monk's Financial Guide to Becoming a Little Bit Wealthy and why that's okay.
Speaker B:And then my new book, as you mentioned, is Taming youg Money Monster, which is a really deep dive psychological insight book.
Speaker B:But I eventually realized that monastic life and I weren't.
Speaker B:Were no longer suited for each other and I was.
Speaker B:Wasn't growing spiritually.
Speaker B:So I took the skills I learned in the monastery out to the world and realized that money could really be a powerful tool for love and service to a suffering world.
Speaker B:When you use it properly.
Speaker B:And that was really the gift I thought I had to bring out into the world.
Speaker B:And cloistered monastic life wasn't really the place for that anymore.
Speaker B:So I became an investment advisor.
Speaker B:I was a partner at a firm called Longview Asset Management here in Santa Fe, where I co managed about a quarter billion dollars in assets.
Speaker B:And then I, I retired from that about a year ago to write this new book, do podcast speaking and public speaking and coaching and all the fun things I get to do now with my life.
Speaker A:So there's so many things out there, and one of the things that comes up a lot is our money traumas.
Speaker A:And what was it when you're at the age of seven that kind of changed your outlook about finances or really started off your.
Speaker A:Your outlook and finances?
Speaker B:Yeah, I think my money trauma started around that age, around 7 or 8, which is right when my parents divorced.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:And you know, I grew up, I was privileged to grow up in a fairly affluent family, which in many ways is a blessing, but it comes with its own set of challenges.
Speaker B:And so my parents, from, from my limited childhood perspective.
Speaker B:Right, that was how I perceived it.
Speaker B:You know, how actually was.
Speaker B:Was up for debate.
Speaker B:But it felt like my parents used the kids as sort of financial pawns in the game of financial chicken.
Speaker B:Like, you know, I'd ask my mom for something and she would say, well, your dad has all the money, Go ask him.
Speaker B:And I'd ask my dad for some, the same thing, and he'd say, well, I give your mom all my money.
Speaker B:She's got all the alimony, alimony and child support.
Speaker B:Go ask her.
Speaker B:And you, eventually you stop asking for stuff unless it was really essential, but it kind of this fight.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:And I also, you know, my parents had their own money trauma because they, they actually grew up in poor immigrant families.
Speaker B:And so they had a lot of money, what I would call money anxiety.
Speaker B:And then I developed in reaction to that, what I would call real money avoidance.
Speaker B:And so I pushed away in reaction to their anxiety.
Speaker B:And so that began this, this money trauma that I've been really trying to overcome.
Speaker B:And I go really deeply into my.
Speaker A:New book now that is interesting because sometimes we actually pick up the other, like one of the aspects of either the mom or usually the parent.
Speaker A:And I did tweet about this.
Speaker A:I was like, I will say that most of the time the children will either adapt the money mindset of the mother.
Speaker A:So would you say that your mother is more of like a spender or the saver?
Speaker B:She was More of this?
Speaker B:Well, she was a certified financial planner.
Speaker B:And I would say she was more.
Speaker B:She was more of the saver, I would say, in the family, but still enjoyed, you know, the material, the good things in life.
Speaker B:So there was definitely that.
Speaker B:And my dad was definitely more of the spender.
Speaker B:He was, he was kind of the, his nickname, you know, my, my.
Speaker B:My dad's nickname behind his back was the big noise.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:Cause he always had to make a big presence whenever he entered a room.
Speaker B:And, and he often used money as part of that.
Speaker B:Like why.
Speaker B:He was what I would call.
Speaker B:He was an enneagram type 3, which we.
Speaker B:We can talk about.
Speaker B:But his money monster was what I called a Blinger.
Speaker B:The person who, who, who works hard, you know, to make a good living, makes good money, but maybe isn't the best saver because all their money is going to.
Speaker B:The bling, to the fancy car, the nice house, the vacations.
Speaker B:They want to impress people with their status symbols, essentially.
Speaker B:And so he was definitely a little more on the, on the.
Speaker B:Less of a saver on that side.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:While we on the topic, can you talk a little bit more about the different levels of that and then we can go back to like a family dynamic?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I mean, are you referring to the different types of the Enneagram?
Speaker B:Is that what you're referring to?
Speaker B:Well, I mean, the Enneagram is a very complicated system and we can only just scratch the surface here.
Speaker B:But essentially what the Enneagram is is it's a personality typology system that we've now been able to ground.
Speaker B:What I'm really excited about, it's an ancient system.
Speaker B:It goes back, you know, quite a ways.
Speaker B: its modern form until around: Speaker B:But the important part of there is that I think what I've been able to do in my new book, taming your money monster is ground it in childhood developmental psychology and the latest research in neurobiology.
Speaker B:So it's not.
Speaker B:Some people think it's a little.
Speaker B:Can be a little woo woo.
Speaker B:But I've really tried to explain the why it works and to give you a little taste of it, it sort of look, works like this.
Speaker B:You've got your personality has lots of components to it, Right.
Speaker B:You've got your nature, which is your DNA, and that's your gene expression.
Speaker B:But then you've got this nurture portion, which is how you were raised.
Speaker B:And so the Enneagram helps us to Better understand the nurture portion of our personality.
Speaker B:It explains the ego defenses we created in childhood to protect us from the things that stressed us or scared us the most consistently in that environment.
Speaker B:And so it also was how we.
Speaker B:And this is some big terms.
Speaker B:It's how we learned it, what psychologists call individuate and differentiate from our parents and our siblings and the rest of reality.
Speaker B:So, but to do that, it works a bit like this.
Speaker B:So imagine like when you were born, you had a physical umbilical.
Speaker B:Umbilical cord.
Speaker B:Cord that was cut.
Speaker B:But you immediately develop a psychological umbilical cord to your caregivers, which is necessary for them to do most of the driving for you in the early years of life, because you.
Speaker B:You're completely helpless.
Speaker B:But there's that egoic codependency that develops, and that has to be severed.
Speaker B:And what we know now from the neurobiology is it can only be cut by the sharpest negative emotions, because positive emotions would reinforce that connection to your caregivers.
Speaker B:And, and those negative emotions usually come through the nose we got in childhood, like, no, don't touch the hot stove, don't kick the dog, don't bite your sister.
Speaker B:But, but that, you know, how those we receive them can.
Speaker B:There's only three.
Speaker B:And this is where this goes off.
Speaker B:The work of a.
Speaker B:Of a.
Speaker B:Of a neuroscientist by the name of Jaak Panksupp.
Speaker B:And what he discovered is that in the mammalian brain, in all mammals, your dog, your cat, you, and me, there's really three core negative emotions.
Speaker B:And all the other more complicated negative emotions are running off this circuitry in some way.
Speaker B:And those three negative emotions are going to be anger, sadness, or shame.
Speaker B:They're kind of interchangeable.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:You can use either one.
Speaker B:And then the third one is going to be fear.
Speaker B:So anger, sadness, or fear.
Speaker B:Which of those did you kind of get exposed more to through the stressors in your childhood environment?
Speaker B:And that gives us sort of.
Speaker B:If you think of a circle, if you draw a circle and cut it into three pie slices, that gets you what we call the triads of the Enneagram.
Speaker B:But then there's only three ways to process those three emotions.
Speaker B:So you can internalize that pain, which is sort of like giving yourself an emotional wedgie.
Speaker B:You can externalize that pain, which is like having a food fight with the world, or you can do both.
Speaker B:And that's why there's nine personality archetypes in the Enneagram system.
Speaker B:So three where you land.
Speaker B:So three 3D of emotions, three ways to process each one.
Speaker B:And, and then that gives you these nine archetypes of personality and Enneagram mean.
Speaker B:In Greek, enneagram means nine and gram means drawn.
Speaker B:So the enneagram is just these nine personalities have drawn out in a circle essentially.
Speaker A:That is so cool.
Speaker B:And, and I'll, I'll.
Speaker B:I'll just maybe I'll explain my type.
Speaker B:I don't really have time to go through all nine of them, but I can explain you a little bit how the system works through one example.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So in my childhood environment, what I got exposed to was more what we call sadness or shame.
Speaker B:So it's a sort of like a technical term for a separation anxiety or it's like a grief around how you perceive yourself.
Speaker B:And so I'm an enneagram type 3.
Speaker B:They're often called the achiever, the performer.
Speaker B:I give all the types, the nine types, car nicknames because I think that's a fun shorthand.
Speaker B:So the nickname for the three is the race car because we're always racing towards the next goal.
Speaker B:We're always trying to achieve stuff in the world, but we tend to leave our authentic selves in the dust to do it.
Speaker B:We're always going for the goal, but we're were putting on masks and performing and, and, and trying to win validation and approval from the people we're around.
Speaker B:And the reason is, is because our, our personality was formed around a.
Speaker B:A sadness or, or shame that we both internalize and externalize.
Speaker B:And so what that means is type threes have an internalized shame about how we perceive ourselves.
Speaker B:And then we have an externalized shame about how we think others perceive us.
Speaker B:You have this internalized shame about how we perceive ourselves and, and then we have this externalized shame about how we think the world perceives us.
Speaker B:So it's sort of like a stereophonic shame.
Speaker B:And that creates for my type.
Speaker B:And we all have it.
Speaker B:We all, we all have a greatest unconscious fear.
Speaker B:And the greatest unconscious fear for a type three is that we're fundamentally worthless, that we don't have any value or place in the world.
Speaker B:Value in the eyes of others, value towards ourselves and value in the eyes of others.
Speaker B:So what that does is we take.
Speaker B:We tend to go out into the world trying to achieve things.
Speaker B:You know, get the A plus in class, win the race, on the track, athletics, whatever, whatever you're.
Speaker B:Doesn't really matter what endeavor it is, or start the company, write the book, you know, get, win applause.
Speaker B:So if I, for example, if I run a marathon and I Come in first place, you are forced to applaud me.
Speaker B:It doesn't matter whether I'm a good person or a bad person, you're society is going to applaud you, right?
Speaker B:So it's trying to win those approval and applause any way we can get it to assuage this deep inner sense of worthlessness that we have.
Speaker B:And then when it comes to money, this is where it gets a little tricky.
Speaker B:So I've layered on top of the any enneagram what I call the attachment theory of money, which for listeners who are familiar with attachment theory of relationships, it's exactly the same thing with a little twist.
Speaker B:And what it says is that we have two unhealthy ways we can relate to money.
Speaker B:One is to be anxiously attached to it.
Speaker B:Think of like your Ebenezer Scrooge or your Gordon Geckos from the, from the movie Wall street.
Speaker B:Or, you know, it's just you can't get enough of it.
Speaker B:You're very acquisitive, maybe to the, to the detriment of yourself and the people around you.
Speaker B:And then there's what I call the money avoidance style, which is my type, where we tend to hate dealing with it.
Speaker B:We push it away.
Speaker B:It brings up all of our negative emotions and we don't want to do our bills or our taxes or, you know, rather not look at this stuff.
Speaker B:And so that creates two money monsters for each type.
Speaker B:So there's nine archetypes, there's 18 money monsters here in the book, but I'll just talk about the two for the types of money monsters for The Enneagram, type 3.
Speaker B:And they.
Speaker B:I call them the barrier and the Blinger.
Speaker B:So the barrier is the avoid type 3, which wants to just stick their head in the sand like an ostrich.
Speaker B:They just don't want to look at it.
Speaker B:It brings up because three, we tend to equate our net worth with our self worth.
Speaker B:And so when our net worth is low, our self worth is low.
Speaker B:We don't.
Speaker B:It's just.
Speaker B:And then we just don't want to know.
Speaker B:Thank you very much.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And then, then there's the opposite side of that, which is the Blinger, which was my dad.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So both my dad and I are type Threes.
Speaker B:He was the Blinger, I was the barrier.
Speaker B:You know, kind of interesting how that played out.
Speaker B:And that's the one who.
Speaker B:All the status symbols to win the approval of the people around them by the fancy car, the nice house, all those things.
Speaker B:And then what the book is trying to do is help you get to the healthiest expression of your type, which for type three, I call it the builder, which is you're using this wealth and money that you've accumulated as a tool for love and service to a suffering world, to kind of fix the crack in the world that you were born to fix.
Speaker B:And the book really lays out what's that journey?
Speaker B:What is the step by step path that we each need to take according to our Enneagram type to achieve that level of financial mastery in all aspects of our financial life.
Speaker B:Now this is where we also have to talk about if you'll, if you'll pardon the sidebar here.
Speaker B:There's also what I call the four pillars of finance.
Speaker B:And so you can be like anxious in one area and avoid in another.
Speaker B:For example.
Speaker B:So the four pillars of finance are going to be earning.
Speaker B:That's your first step on your journey.
Speaker B:The second pillar is going to be saving.
Speaker B:Pretty obvious.
Speaker B:The third pillar is going to be investing.
Speaker B:And then the fourth pillar is giving.
Speaker B:So earning, saving, investing and giving are so the four pillars of your financial life.
Speaker B:And most of us aren't purely anxious or avoidant in all areas.
Speaker B:We might be an anxious earner, but an avoidant saver.
Speaker B:Or it might be an anxious saver but an avoidant investor.
Speaker B:We might be a great investor, but we never give back to anybody.
Speaker B:It's just for me it's selfish.
Speaker B:So how are you using this wealth as a tool to make the world a better place?
Speaker B:And so again, going through all the nine types in the book, it's like what is your path to overcoming your money trauma?
Speaker B:Identifying your trauma, overcoming your trauma and then building a robust financial life in all four pillars.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker A:Because it's bringing up.
Speaker A:Because I was thinking about like so many different books of the one, especially with Charles Duhigg, which is really understanding your triggers, figuring out your routines and then what is that reward?
Speaker A:It's like everything coming back to threes.
Speaker A:Like I really love this thing because from a numerologist, I'm not a numerologist, but I do enjoy understanding how things come in threes a lot.
Speaker A:I think Tesla said that was a three, like seven and something else five or something like that was like the common numbers of the universe.
Speaker A:And I thought that was actually pretty cool.
Speaker A:And here we are talking about it again, which is actually awesome.
Speaker B:But if you want to get, if you want to get a numerology, there's a whole thing on the Enneagram and it's really interesting when you get it gets there's all these patterns that pop out numerologically, if you're curious about that.
Speaker B:But that's too much to cover here.
Speaker A:Yes, I'll definitely be.
Speaker A:I'm open to learning about different books about it because, you know, if we can look at the patterns in life and how we actually operate and really.
Speaker A:And then think once we understand the patterns, that helps us understand the triggers, then we can start looking at our routines to start figuring out those triggers.
Speaker A:On why are we avoiding a saver?
Speaker A:Or why are we avoiding giving to other people?
Speaker A:And then sometimes some people just are like, hey, I don't make enough to finance all these different areas.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:Which is fair.
Speaker A:And plus with the sandwich generation, which is my audience.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Their money is already tied up with the kids and also dealing with their parents.
Speaker A:So how do they find time for themselves?
Speaker B:That's a hard question.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And so it takes a lot of discipline, is the simple answer.
Speaker B:And priority setting, like, I'm not saying it's easy, you know, and I'm, I'm a little bit in that sandwich generation myself.
Speaker B:On the edge of it.
Speaker B:But like a lot of it, the first rule of finance is pay yourself first.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:You got to take care of you before you're ready to take care of other people.
Speaker B:And that can be really hard.
Speaker B:Make some very hard decisions, you know, with the people that you love, you never want to leave them hanging.
Speaker B:But you also can't, you know, decimate your own financial future, you know, martyring yourself for others.
Speaker B:So it's a really.
Speaker B:There's no simple solution to that, that question, otherwise you wouldn't have a podcast dedicated entirely to it.
Speaker B:You'd have one episode and you'd be done.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:It's so true.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So a lot of it is going to be discipline and priority setting, to put it simply.
Speaker B:But if you want to get into more specifics, we can.
Speaker A:I mean, let's go for it because I want people to.
Speaker A:I want the person that's listening to this to actually have something to walk away with, like a product sense of like, hey, I can actually do this today.
Speaker B:Yeah, well, I mean, again, I've got, so I've got.
Speaker B:This is a shameless self plug.
Speaker B:But I would say go, go, go pick up my books that everything you need is in there.
Speaker B:I've got two books out.
Speaker B:The first book is, Is, you know, from Monk to Money Manager is going to give you the practical tools of how to manage your money, like the budgeting, the saving, like the taxes, the insurance, like how does all this stuff work?
Speaker B:I would say maybe the simplest thing you need to know is, and I assume your audience is probably fairly, at least proficient in this, which is basic financial literacy.
Speaker B:Like, you need to be listening to podcasts like this.
Speaker B:You need to be reading books.
Speaker B:You need to be.
Speaker B:Make sure you understand the language of finance, because it's a foreign language and you need to teach it to your kids.
Speaker B:Like, that was the biggest frustration for me was that, you know, my mom was a cpa, my dad was a CEO of a chemical company, and.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And talking about money was a taboo subject.
Speaker B:It was easier for my parents to talk about sex than money.
Speaker B:And I think that's true for many people.
Speaker B:It's like what I would say, one takeaway is start having good conversations with your partner and then with your kids and with your parents about money.
Speaker B:Like, have open and transparent communication.
Speaker B:If you can start there, other.
Speaker B:Other avenues will begin to open up and things will become a little less.
Speaker B:At least you can get people.
Speaker B:You need to get people on the same page and understand where things are really at.
Speaker B:And that means understanding where you're at with your finances.
Speaker B:You got to have your house in order.
Speaker B:And so that would be my first.
Speaker B:Become financially literate and talk about money with your.
Speaker B:With the people in your life.
Speaker B:I got two books.
Speaker B:The first book will tell you how to do it, and my second book, Taming youg Money Monster, is going to give you all the practical psychological tips about why you struggle with money.
Speaker B:What is it?
Speaker B:What are your money traumas?
Speaker B:Where are they coming from?
Speaker B:And how to.
Speaker B:How to.
Speaker B:How to really conquer them.
Speaker B:So that would be my quick tip, my quick take.
Speaker A:Hey, no, thank you for the quick take, because that is definitely one of the things that a lot of people don't do is.
Speaker A:Well, sometimes it's just a communication piece.
Speaker A:I'm gonna backtrack that a little bit because sometimes we are so passionate about it as far as, like, hey, I just found something that's really cool that can help us out in our family.
Speaker A:It just doesn't come off well to the partners.
Speaker A:Like, well, I mean, our bills are paid.
Speaker A:Like, what else do you want us to do?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:So how do you say would be the best way to communicate?
Speaker A:Because, you know, with your wife, how did that work out?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So here's where the Enneagram can be helpful again.
Speaker B:If you understand your partner's Enneagram type, you.
Speaker B:You understand what their deepest unconscious fear is and what's what.
Speaker B:What's triggering them.
Speaker B:What are they really looking for.
Speaker B:From their money and from you.
Speaker B:And if you can address that fear in the conversation, if you're talking to the person in the way that they can hear you and you're not triggering them, then you're going to.
Speaker B:Conversation is going to go a lot more smoothly.
Speaker B:So each of the Enneagram types has different communication styles in general and around money.
Speaker B:And when you understand that, it's like, oh, this is what's really going on behind the conversation.
Speaker B:There's a.
Speaker B:There's a reason behind the reason behind the reason of what.
Speaker B:What's.
Speaker B:What's happening here.
Speaker B:And that will, I think, smooth things along a little bit.
Speaker B:And then knowing what your triggers are like, okay, this is.
Speaker B:And trying not to take that breath, to have that pause when those triggers come up between, you know, so you're taking right action rather than reacting.
Speaker B:And so what happens in money conversations is.
Speaker B:And I saw this a lot in my financial practices is you see the couples reacting to each other out of like, you know, this purchase brings up all the recriminations of 5,000 things you did wrong in the past 10 years.
Speaker B:And suddenly we're talking about that vacation from Tahiti that happened in 15 rather than the thing.
Speaker B:The budget on the table.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Or the, or the thing that really.
Speaker B:So it's really getting the conversation focused and letting go of the recriminations in the past and a lot of it required.
Speaker B:Well, I would say I would give you three things that would be helpful.
Speaker B:In general, not going into the specifics of Enneagram types is first, you need compassion.
Speaker B:You need compassion for yourself, and you need compassion for the other person.
Speaker B:And then you need contemplation.
Speaker B:You need time to be thinking deeply about what's really going on in your.
Speaker B:In the situation.
Speaker B:And then you need to come together in right action.
Speaker B:So there's contemplation, compassion, action.
Speaker B:How do you bring those three tools together to really move the conversation forward into a healthy space?
Speaker A:So what tools that you currently use to kind of manage your finances?
Speaker A:Is it like paper and pen?
Speaker A:Excel?
Speaker A:Because I'm still a spreadsheet kind of guy.
Speaker B:I'm so.
Speaker B:I'm a Quicken guy.
Speaker B:You know, I've always used it.
Speaker B:It's not my favorite, but I, you know, the problem with software is once you start using one, it's very hard to switch over.
Speaker B:So it's not that I have.
Speaker B:I'm not trying to plug that one for.
Speaker B:But it does work for me and it seems to get.
Speaker B:Get the job done.
Speaker A:Well, they might not be Sponsoring now, but we give a shout out if y' all listening.
Speaker B:You know, if Quicken wants a sponsor, I'm happy to sign an endorsement deal.
Speaker B:Reach out, I'll do it.
Speaker B:I'll tell everybody how amazing you are.
Speaker B:But it is, you know, it's a very popular tool and it's got all, everything in it that you need.
Speaker B:I could, I could give, give some pointers on how to improve some of their windows, but that's okay.
Speaker B:They're getting there.
Speaker A:Yeah, I mean, they working because one of the things that a lot of us is that we find we know how to make the money, we can spend the money.
Speaker A:But what is it in your life that you have felt was the biggest impact to you?
Speaker B:That's a deep question.
Speaker B:It was probably, well, the biggest impact was the monastery going bankrupt.
Speaker B:Like, that just was a pivotal moment where I, I realized no one's going to care about your finances or the money situation in your life more than you.
Speaker B:And what it requires is radical responsibility.
Speaker B:Even if it's not your fault.
Speaker B:Like it doesn't, it's not about blame.
Speaker B:It's like you, you might, might be response.
Speaker B:You may have not created the situation that you're in, but you are responsible for it.
Speaker B:If you want to fix it, no one else is going to do it.
Speaker B:So it's that radical.
Speaker B:So I don't say self reliance isn't, is maybe too harsh because you need others in your community.
Speaker B:You need to build that trust and support with people around you as well.
Speaker B:It's not just a solo job, but in some ways it kind of is.
Speaker B:You know, no one's going to do your budgeting for you, no one's going to pay your bills for you, no one's going to make the money for you, no one's going to do the saving.
Speaker B:All those things, it's all on you.
Speaker B:And so once you take that mindset, then it's like, all right, let's do it.
Speaker B:Like, let's get into it.
Speaker B:And I see a lot of people want to outsource this to their spouse.
Speaker B:They want to outsource it to.
Speaker B:And some things, if there's some tasks you're not really good at and you have the resources, it's fine.
Speaker B:If you want to hire an investment advisor, you want to hire a cpa, you want to hire a bookkeeper.
Speaker B:If you just suck at it, you just can't do your bookkeeping and it's in your budget, we'll outsource it just like you would do me Outsource Cleaning your house, you can do it, but you don't like it.
Speaker B:So I'll pay someone to take that off my plate.
Speaker B:That, that can be a way around it.
Speaker B:At the end of the day, you can, and this is something I learned in the Marines, which I was very grateful for, is even when you outsource work, you can outsource.
Speaker B:What was it?
Speaker B:You can, you can delegate authority, right?
Speaker B:You can delegate the authority to a bookkeeper, but you can't delegate the responsibility.
Speaker A:So true, right?
Speaker B:You still got it.
Speaker B:You still got to be able to check their work.
Speaker B:You still gotta be financially literate to know that they did a good job.
Speaker B:And you gotta be on top of that.
Speaker B:So even when you, when you're outsourcing menial tasks you don't like to do, someone does your taxes.
Speaker B:You should know enough about taxes to look at it and go, you screwed this up, man.
Speaker B:You're not very good.
Speaker B:I'm firing you.
Speaker B:Or, great, you know, thank you very much.
Speaker B:I'm going to refer you to my friends.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:So there's still a responsibility you have even in those situations.
Speaker A:Because I'm bringing up two examples who when come back to doing your taxes, I believe Tyler Perry had lost almost, what, $10 million because of the tax person did not file correctly.
Speaker A:And then I think it was.
Speaker A:Forgot his name, but Fat Joe, he's a rap artist, had went to jail because his tax person was actually taking the money and not paying the taxes, even though he was paying the tax person to pay the money.
Speaker A:So, yeah, and it's your responsibility.
Speaker A:They sign a thing.
Speaker A:And he couldn't fight it in court either because you said, hey, I let this person do it on my behalf.
Speaker A:So it's ridiculous.
Speaker A:Like, but still, you got to go back and double check the work and really make sure it's on what it's supposed to do.
Speaker A:So being selfish, which is, I think it's fair to say, to be selfish in your financial earnings and your financial life.
Speaker A:But what is that?
Speaker A:How do you actually spread that out to your families?
Speaker A:When you, you know, when you had your children, did you instill them in them?
Speaker A:Like, hey, when you get your first allowance, you going to put your money inside this particular jar or this envelope or this bank account like that, or how did you do it?
Speaker B:Well, I wouldn't, I wouldn't be the best person to ask.
Speaker B:I don't have children, children of my own.
Speaker B:I was married for a while and had a step, a stepson who, who I adore.
Speaker B:But so, so that wasn't really as a step parent I had some limited ability to influence that situation.
Speaker B:But I was a high school and teacher for 20 years.
Speaker B:I taught economics and personal finance to kids.
Speaker B:And believe I think the number one thing with your kids is, is make sure they're as financially literate as they are.
Speaker B:Just like want them to be able to read books like they should be able to understand.
Speaker B:It's giving them some basic skills.
Speaker B:So allowances are a great way to start.
Speaker B:You start there.
Speaker B:This would be my tip is like instill in the allowance the same kind of structure you want them to have as an adult.
Speaker B:So okay, you've, you've got $10 allowance, 15% goes to savings right off the top.
Speaker B:We're going to put that into a savings account for you or an investment account for you, whatever that is.
Speaker B:I think for kids.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And I would say and then help them build up an emergency savings.
Speaker B:Teach them what that looks like.
Speaker B:Even for them it might be small.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:When you get to 50 bucks or 100 bucks, now you've got an emergency depending on their age.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:And you can go up to college, get whatever is age appropriate, make sure they have an emergency savings first and then, and then beyond that, make sure they're investing the rest of it somewhere like that.
Speaker B:The 15% first goes to save to the merchant.
Speaker B:Now you've got the extra bit.
Speaker B:Now we're, we're buying you an index fund, right.
Speaker B:And we're putting that into some long term.
Speaker B:Teach them how an index fund works.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:And then the, the both of those are buckets.
Speaker B:You don't touch and let them see how compound growth works and say if you can show a kid from the age of 5 to 15 the power of compound interest and then suddenly now they can, hopefully they don't do it to do something crazy like buy a car.
Speaker B:But they might have money for college, they might have money for, you know, or they might have money for their, if they could keep that going, they're all set for retirement by the time they're, they're 35 or 40.
Speaker B:So that would be my tip.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:And now because we go to the parents side of the house.
Speaker A:But you know, one of the things that I was thinking back in our conversation was yes, the monastery had went.
Speaker A:I'm sorry, is it a monastery or.
Speaker A:Yeah, okay, so if the monastery went bankrupt, what did you do to kind of get them out of that?
Speaker A:Was it like, did you like, hey, hey everybody, we want to make some things, we're going to sell it right quick or we don't have a parade or.
Speaker A:What was it?
Speaker B:Well, that's the beauty of bankruptcy is it wipes out the debts, most of them.
Speaker B:So, so that was, that was probably why we had to go through.
Speaker B:It was we, we had more debt than we could service with our income.
Speaker B:So the beauty of bankruptcy is it does give you a fresh start.
Speaker B:And so wiping the slate clean was a godsend.
Speaker B:It was very stressful to go through, and it was very painful.
Speaker B:But thank God we have bankruptcy laws on our books so people aren't stuck in indentured servitude for the rest of their lives.
Speaker B:So getting that fresh start and then rebuilding credit, rebuilding all the savings, emergency funds, and then making sure now that we've got that blank slate, we're doing it right from the ground up.
Speaker A:And what systems did you put in place to make sure that they were able to, to not go into that same system again?
Speaker B:Well, I took charge of all the finances.
Speaker B:That's kind of what happened.
Speaker B:This is, this is my, this is my domain.
Speaker B:I, I, I've, I'm taking responsibility for it.
Speaker B:You guys want to look over my shoulder anytime, feel free.
Speaker B:And they never did.
Speaker B:They didn't care.
Speaker B:You know, I'm like, here, here's, it's open.
Speaker B:The books are open.
Speaker B:But, you know, we're not, we're not going down that road again.
Speaker A:Okay, so did you make sure?
Speaker A:Like, because I'm not sure.
Speaker A:Can they invest?
Speaker A:Do you put, like, investments for them or just mostly just strictly savings and give?
Speaker B:There are some investments.
Speaker B:I mean, there's still retirement just, you know, we were a teaching order, so we were all working in private school.
Speaker B:So there's, there's small, there's some small retirement funds that needed to be managed.
Speaker B:So, yeah, there was some investing going on there as well.
Speaker A:The only reason why I asked, because I'm not familiar with how that system works.
Speaker A:I just knew that they do like, a lot of, I just hear about a lot of giving to the community, and you don't hear about too much, too many ways on how they make money.
Speaker B:So, yeah, so, so they're teaching us how we support ourselves.
Speaker B:But, and, and, and this was another money monster that came up in the community was the giving side.
Speaker B:It was this, this guilt around if someone came to us in need that we felt compelled to help even if we didn't have the resources to do so.
Speaker B:So some of the, some, some, not all the debt was just like over an overextension of generosity.
Speaker B:It's like if you're Giving more than coming in.
Speaker B:Eventually, you know, things are going to fall apart.
Speaker B:So there has to be.
Speaker B:There has to be some discernment about what's possible.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:But if somebody's a good giver, how do you help them?
Speaker A:Like, what is something that they can question themselves and say, like, you know what, you need to stop this.
Speaker A:You need to focus on self.
Speaker B:Well, a lot that goes back again back to your Enneagram types.
Speaker B:The.
Speaker B:There's one, and this was true for one of the key figures in the monastery.
Speaker B:And I'm not trying to point blame or anything, but like one of the archetypes is what's called the giver or the helper, excuse me, sometimes called the giver.
Speaker B:And one of the things with this is called the type 2 on the enneagram.
Speaker B:They're adjacent to my type type 3.
Speaker B:And they're also in the.
Speaker B:In this shame triad, which is.
Speaker B:So the type 2, the helper has this externalized shame about how they think the world perceives them.
Speaker B:And so they.
Speaker B:That creates their greatest fear that they're unlovable.
Speaker B:So they're always trying to help others to win love and approval.
Speaker B:And so what the type 2 needs to learn how to do.
Speaker B:But the problem is they give, but they give with strings attached.
Speaker B:It's like, I'm going to give you help.
Speaker B:I'm going to.
Speaker B:I'm going to.
Speaker B:Well, you know that there's that parable of the story.
Speaker B:It's always better to teach a person to fish than to give them a fish every day.
Speaker B:Well, the Type 2 is the kind of person who would rather give someone a fish every day with a side of tartar sauce and a note that says, you're amazing.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:Because they want the constant flow of gratitude.
Speaker B:They're not doing it purely altruistically.
Speaker B:There's a.
Speaker B:There's an unconscious pay to play scheme that's going on there.
Speaker B:And that.
Speaker B:That was, that came in.
Speaker B:Came in.
Speaker B:That was a factor, not the only factor.
Speaker B:There were many others that, that caused our community to go a little bit in the hole is the sense of I'm giving because I want the approval, I want the calculations.
Speaker B:I want you to see how, how generous I am.
Speaker B:And that's a spiritual trap because it's not real generosity.
Speaker B:It's conditional.
Speaker B:It's like, I'll give, but they're feeding off that dopamine hit of other people's approval.
Speaker B:They're not really giving.
Speaker B:They are helpful.
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:So that's, that's one archetype that you know people can fall into.
Speaker B:And then how you overcome that.
Speaker B:Well, that's a whole.
Speaker B:In the book, I lay out a whole map about for each of the types of what's your ego structure, explains what your shadow structure is, what your enlightenment structure is.
Speaker B:How do you overcome it?
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:It's not a simple.
Speaker B:It's not a simple answer.
Speaker B:It's, it's, it's, it's not a hard answer, but it's just more than we have time for in a podcast, let's put it that way.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:But it's not easy to implement.
Speaker A:Yeah, I accept because my mom's actually one of those people likes to help.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:I'm like, just say no.
Speaker A:Or like, you don't have to physically be in their space for certain times.
Speaker A:Like, just mail them the book or mail them the gift.
Speaker A:They'll be fine.
Speaker A:Like, they don't have to give everybody a gift.
Speaker A:It's okay.
Speaker B:And, and maybe the simple answer for your mom and for all type twos is you gotta find that in love internally through your spiritual practice, whatever that is, you need to connect deeply with that source, God, divine.
Speaker B:Whatever your, whatever your understanding of God and the divine is, you need to feel that love inside yourself first towards yourself, and then you don't need it from the outside world as much.
Speaker B:And then you're more grounded and you're giving from a place of authenticity and freedom rather than from compulsion.
Speaker A:I like that.
Speaker A:So as we go into the third segment here, which is the futures, because you already, you've been through the Marines, you did the tough stuff.
Speaker A:You've been through some tough stuff from early childhood, and you even been through some tough stuff going through the monastery and now challenging yourself to actually be a speaker, to be out there in the real world.
Speaker A:What is next for you?
Speaker B:Well, hopefully, you know, I'm just getting.
Speaker B:I'm launching myself on the public speaking stage and having a lot of fun with that.
Speaker B:So I, in a year from now, I would like to be doing a lot more public speaking, selling a lot more books.
Speaker B:I would also like to work on my next book.
Speaker B:I've got two more in the back of my brain that I want to work on.
Speaker B:So there's more books in the future.
Speaker B:There's a lot more public speaking in the future and then coaching clients.
Speaker B:I love working individually, one on one with people and really helping them through their struggles.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:It's one of my greatest joys.
Speaker A:And this is awesome.
Speaker A:I would love to catch up with you in a year, just to kind of see where you're at and maybe I might see you on stage with me.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Anyway, listening.
Speaker B:If you want to come talk to your church, you want to come talk to your, your business, your community, whatever you got a corporation needs.
Speaker B:You got money monsters hanging around, Come, come check me out.
Speaker B:You can find me on my website@dougline.com shameless plug.
Speaker B:And also my books are there, too.
Speaker A:Awesome.
Speaker A:Is there anything you want to say to the audience before we get to the final four questions?
Speaker B:I think, you know, any way you can support my work, I'd appreciate it.
Speaker A:Awesome.
Speaker A:All right, you ready for the final four?
Speaker A:All right, so the final four questions are four questions that I asked every guest for the past three years, four years now, because they've been changing around.
Speaker A:But I try to make sure these are about the same questions.
Speaker A:And so let's go.
Speaker A:Number one, what does wealth mean to you?
Speaker B:It means having the options to live a life that makes your soul sing.
Speaker A:Number two, what was your worst money mistake?
Speaker B:Outsourcing my responsibility to other people.
Speaker A:Can you say one of them?
Speaker A:I'm sorry, like, if you can explain that a little bit more.
Speaker B:Well, like I mentioned earlier, you know, no one's going to care about your money more than you.
Speaker B:And so it was that sense of abdicating my responsibility for my finances to other people, trusting that, you know, trusting that they knew it more than I did, they were more competent, they.
Speaker B:But they weren't going to care as much as I did.
Speaker B:And so things fell apart.
Speaker B:Like in the monastery.
Speaker B:I was completely oblivious to what was going on financially in the community.
Speaker B:I just took a hands off approach and figured these people who are older and wiser in many, many ways are just going to be.
Speaker B:Just because someone's competent in one area of life doesn't mean they're competent in another.
Speaker B:And so people who I trusted because they were so wise in so many and so knowledgeable and so experienced and so amazing in so many aspects of life, doesn't mean they're competent at managing money.
Speaker B:And I, and I sort of outsourced my responsibility even for the community's finances, and that didn't work.
Speaker B:And so I learned that lesson the hard way.
Speaker A:So powerful.
Speaker A:Number three, is there a book that inspired your journey or changed your perspective?
Speaker B:Yeah, I think that there's a book I really love by Charles Whelan.
Speaker B:It's called Naked Economics.
Speaker B:And it's a good primer for.
Speaker B:It's not really about.
Speaker B:If you really want to understand how economics works.
Speaker B:Like if you're if you're interested in the big picture.
Speaker B:And also it's a very entertaining.
Speaker B:It's funny, it's well written, it's an easy read.
Speaker B:It will break things down, these very complicated economic concepts in a really simple way.
Speaker B:To give you an understanding of how finance investing in the.
Speaker B:The whole system really works.
Speaker A:I'm going to have to check that one out.
Speaker A:Like, I've never heard of that one.
Speaker B:That's a good one.
Speaker A:Number four, what is your favorite dish to make?
Speaker B:Spadini.
Speaker B:Now, it's an Italian dish and it comes in a lot of different varieties.
Speaker B:But the way I was taught to make it is you get a really nice piece of steak.
Speaker B:I like to use like a.
Speaker B:A New York strip steak works really well, but you gotta get it from your butcher and you have to have them slice it.
Speaker B:Sort of like if you put the.
Speaker B:Put it outside and slice it vertically in slices.
Speaker B:So you get these really thin, long strips of meat, and then you pound it with a mallet to tenderize it.
Speaker B:And in one end, you stick a big hunk of whole milk mozzarella, grate a bunch of pecorino Romano cheese on it, throw some salt and pepper on it.
Speaker B:Then you roll it into.
Speaker B:Into like a little like a roll.
Speaker B:Stick a toothpick in it or two, whatever you need.
Speaker B:And then you fry those in butter until they caramelize.
Speaker B:And it's just absolutely divine that with a big loaf of a good baguette and a bottle of red wine and a good salad.
Speaker B:Oh, you're all set, man.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:I'm starving.
Speaker A:Like, making me hungry.
Speaker A:Oh, man.
Speaker A:So this was awesome.
Speaker A:This is the very last question of the whole show.
Speaker A:You mentioned it before, but we got to say it again.
Speaker A:Where could people find out more about you, Doug?
Speaker B:Yeah, my website is douglineham.com that's D O U G L Y N as in Nicholas, A m as in Michael.com and you can find all kinds of great resources there.
Speaker B:I've got.
Speaker B:I've got my YouTube stuff, I've got all the podcast appearances.
Speaker B:I've got articles, resources, books, coaching tips.
Speaker A:Awesome.
Speaker A:And thank you so much for your time that this has been amazing.
Speaker A:I've learned a lot.
Speaker A:Definitely.
Speaker A:I'm going to do some more research about the Enneagrams and so that I can actually know what my, like, at least know what my fear is about finances.
Speaker A:Like, I think I know what it is, but this is actually going to take me to the next level.
Speaker A:So thank you so much.
Speaker B:If you want to stick around for a few minutes.
Speaker B:I can help you type yourself.
Speaker A:Yeah, let's do it.
Speaker A:All right, so for you who are listening, please make sure that y' all go back, rewind it, take notes, leave a review, and I just want to continue on and make sure that you all are successful.
Speaker A:Thank you all.
Speaker B:Take care.
Speaker B:Thanks, Anthony.
Speaker B:Appreciate a lot.
