Know Your Money with Bronwyn Waner and Craig Finch
Know Your Money with Bronwyn Waner and Craig Finch
87. The Power of Financial Clarity and Purpose for a Fulfilled Retirement 1 of 7
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Can clarity in your financial decision-making be the difference between thriving and mere survival? Join us on "Know Your Money" as we welcome Rob from Fundhouse, who brings riveting insights from his book The 7 Pillars of Financial Health, starting with the first "C": Clarity.
Rob shares a gripping story about his father, a World War II pilot who survived a perilous crash into the Red Sea by staying with the wreckage. This powerful narrative underlines the importance of having clear principles and values when navigating uncertain times, much like in financial planning. Discover how trusting the current, as Rob's father did, can translate into making sound financial choices.
In the next segment, we focus on the delicate balance of achieving financial wellness and joy, especially during retirement. We discuss the pitfalls of accumulating wealth without a clear purpose, citing compelling studies from UCLA and Harvard that link aimless accumulation with unhappiness and early death. Through real-life examples, this episode explores the significance of planning your time and investing in relationships for a fulfilling retirement. Learn the art of knowing when to say no to further financial gain, so you can truly savor life and maintain meaningful connections.
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www.growthfp.co.za
Welcome to Know your Money, where we will explore our relationship with money and how the psychology of it impacts our financial decisions, as everyone thinks about money differently. In our podcast, we'll be presenting a variety of financial topics in an easy to understand way, which we hope will assist you with managing your money. Hello everybody, welcome to Know your Money. Craig Warren, how are you guys today?
Speaker 2:All good, warren, you're looking remarkably relaxed, still Amazing. Yeah, life is good. Eh yeah, it's all happening and it's looking good. Oh, thank you, craig. I see we've got Rob back in the studio. I know I'm excited for this, yeah.
Speaker 3:Thanks very much for having me back.
Speaker 2:Thank you for coming All the way from Cape Town, Rob.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1:So, rob, what we thought we could do is potentially just unpack your book a little bit and do like a series in a way and go through each of the C's. So Craig, do you know what the first C was in his book?
Speaker 2:It's clarity and, rob, please tell the story of your late dad, what his adventure was all those years ago.
Speaker 3:Yeah, okay, yeah, great Thanks, Craig, I'll do that. Yeah, I mean, I think the first C is clarity, just because I think that it's the most important thing for clients to try and get is clarity about what they want from their money and, more importantly, what they want from their life. And so in the book I relate a story, as you say, craig, about my father, which I think has a lesson about clarity. So my father was a pilot in the Second World War. He flew Wellington bombers, and it's interesting about that because what I'm still staggered about is that they were actually made out of canvas and balsa wood and they used to fly over the Alps, you know, which is extraordinary. So it was like these structures that they used to get off the ground, and he survived, which is amazing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, he survived the whole wall. Yeah, that's right. I know yeah, because I mean usually when they went out on a sortie or whatever, at least half the planes wouldn't come back. So you were really sort of one in two chance.
Speaker 2:Right, I mean.
Speaker 3:And to that point on one of the. You know, what he always used to say whenever they went off, took off, was they had a crew of six and they had a tail gunner, co-pilot, navigator and then a couple of bombers or people to handle the bombs. And he used to always say to his tail gunner, who was a very nervous guy named Smithy, he'd always say to him just before takeoff you know, smithy, you can't live forever. So he had a bit of a dry sense of humor. Anyway, on one occasion they were doing a sort of a training exercise over the Red Sea and his plane came down and they crashed into the Red Sea and obviously everything just imploded on impact. Three of them survived the crash and they were in the water together and there was sort of debris and sort of wreckage around them and then they realized there were also sharks in the water swimming around them. So it's a double whammy. And it was dark, it was nighttime, like a horror movie.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it was like a horror movie.
Speaker 3:Luckily, my father was very calm in nature and I think that that probably was his saving grace. But also they had to make some decisions. In that water and with the sharks swimming around, obviously, the decision was well, what do you do? And the other two guys decided that the best thing to do was to swim and just swim away from the sharks. Get away from them because they're there. I suppose they were thinking that the sharks are interested in all the stuff in the water and there's probably fuel and all that stuff there. Anyway, they swam off and they were never seen again.
Speaker 3:My father decided that he would stay with the wreckage. He hung on to some part of the fuselage and his theory was that he would let the current take him in whichever direction they would go. It's dark, he didn't even know where it was going to take him, but I mean, when we were growing up he would always. When we were in the sea, he would always drum it into us. If you get taken by a rip, you let the rip take, you let the current take. You don't ever swim against the current. So he was always very strong on that. The sea is much stronger than you are and that's a fundamental principle.
Speaker 3:You know, and so he made the decision to hang on and obviously the fact that we're telling the story is that he ended up in the sort of I think he was in the water for about 10 hours and then got washed up onto the sort of Arabian coast, north Africa, and actually got picked up by some Arabian soldiers who were there because they were searching, because they'd heard that there'd been a crash, and he got put onto a camel and Most people a camel ride is a bucket list item For him. It was sort of a necessity. They took him off I think it was a two-day camel ride to a hospital but he fortunately wasn't too badly injured. He sort of recovered there and then went back into action.
Speaker 3:But why do I relate that story in this section on clarity in the book?
Speaker 3:It's because I think it parallels the world that you as financial planners live in and we as clients live in, and that is that the future is always uncertain. So when my dad and his two crewmen made those decisions, they were made in very uncertain circumstances. The water's murky, it's dark, you don't know what's going to happen. And we are always having to do that. We always have to make decisions with uncertainty because nobody can predict the future, and so I think that what's important with respect to financial planning is what do we need clarity about? And I think one of the things, for example, is sort of principles, and what are the clear principles that we have around? What we want to do with our life and our money or values, is another word you could use, you know. And then, craig Warren sorry, in a previous podcast you shared that your wife quite likes going out for a cup of coffee in the morning, and that reflects a value which I really respect because I do the same thing.
Speaker 3:You know it is a cost I do share in the book that Warren Buffett goes every morning to McDonald's for his breakfast, Nutritious breakfast at.
Speaker 3:McDonald's. And it's quite funny because I think what happens is a bit like your envelope story, bronwyn, because his wife, he never knows every morning what he's going to be able to afford to buy at McDonald's. Because his wife gives him, I think, either $2.20 or $2.70 in cash in his hand, oh my word. And depending on how much he gets determines what he can buy. But I think he always buys like the same burger or whatever it is. But I think it depends whether you can get a coffee or a Coke or whatever. Sure, anyway, he gets allocated his breakfast times. But yeah, that's how they made all the money.
Speaker 4:Yeah, exactly, no, no.
Speaker 3:He's very frugal.
Speaker 4:I need to try that with my wife.
Speaker 1:This is your coffee allowance for the week.
Speaker 2:For just a daily Well, I mean.
Speaker 3:I daily. Well, I mean, I don't know if you, I mean you probably do know the sort of the anecdotes about how frugal he is.
Speaker 4:you know the fact that he sort of he drives an old car, doesn't he?
Speaker 3:Old house, lives in the same house for 40, 50 years Well, longer now, you know. But yeah, so I think the point of the first pillar, what I call the seven pillars of financial health no-transcript, because to help somebody work out what they want from life is tough, but I think that that's really where the real value is in the work that you do. But you could comment on that.
Speaker 4:Hi everyone, if you would like to get a copy of Rob's book the Seven Pillars of Financial Health, we have shared a link in the bio with the web address as well as a discount code you can use. The book retails for 375 Rand excluding delivery, and with this promo code you will pay 370, which includes delivery. Alternatively, you can find the book at exclusive books or other bookstores. We would like to thank you for listening and please remember to like, subscribe and share the podcast so that we can bring on more exciting guests like Rob to help you with knowing yourself and knowing your money.
Speaker 2:Well, I always say time and money is so important and no good having all the money in the world, you don't have the time and also how to allocate your time. We've spoken off air about clients who try and retire and they have nothing to do. They're in point, they've got the money, they sit on the stoop for three months and then they've got no purpose in life and often those people pass very young after retirement and often the people that have great lives ahead of them, they still have purpose in their retirement and they allocate their time. They don't need to worry about money because they've done that part their work in life, but they have the time to allocate to projects or things that they can have meaning for and help other people.
Speaker 3:I think, yeah, it's interesting because, funnily enough, in the book, in the section on clarity, I actually referred to a study done by the University of California, los Angeles, where they studied time, people's use of time, and you so often hear people talk about how I spend my time the word spend and they talk about if one had to reframe that to say how do you invest your time and they make the point to what you're saying as well. They say that the more people plan their time into the future and think about how they're going to invest in time into the future, they end up being happier. So it doesn't just stop at an end point, like retirement. They've thought about what they want to invest their time in, you know, almost to the end of their lives.
Speaker 4:Well, I've seen a few of these YouTube videos of guys who decided at the age of coming out of university. You know that the most important thing to them was the financial freedom they could have as young as possible. Important thing to them was the financial freedom they could have as young as possible. So the idea of putting as much away as they could during their 20s and early 30s and investing in their future and their greatest asset, which is their time. And they got to the point now where they are financially free. They're coming up to 40 years old and no longer have to worry about money.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 4:And I think that sort of clarity. I wish I had that at 20. If I could go back, the one thing I would change about my life is I would have massively invested in my future younger, knowing that I wouldn't have to ever worry about money when I got older and then had the time to spend with my family whenever I wanted, and never had to take on work I didn't want to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's where, like in our practice and us building on our philosophy of the seven different relationships, and we try to help you have clarity, because you need to see all of those different areas. You know, yes, financial independence is what you want to work towards, but have you protected yourself if your earnings stop because you get hurt by something? Are you saving? What are you spending on? Are you keeping for emergencies? And I really believe that the way we do it with our clients really helps to have that clarity, because it's not just one goal. You really have to be clear about everything in your life and your money.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, because I think the one risk I mean, I'm probably just envious of those guys, but I think the one flip side to that and I think I might have shared this in a previous podcast was the financial planner telling me that their wealthiest client is miserable and really struggling with life because they had put all their energy into making the money. They thought the money was going to make them happy, and I think that's possibly one of the biggest myths that we all should be aware of that money itself doesn't make you happy. Yes, it enables stuff, and I think it was who was it?
Speaker 3:Zaza Gabor, or somebody said you know, people say it's not all about money or something, but you know, tell them that when they have to go grocery shopping, you know that it is about money is very important to us. Shopping, you know that it is about money, is very important to us, but the risk we run if we don't have clarity about what we want from life is that we put all our energy into that, you know. And then, as you say, what about the rest of your life and how?
Speaker 1:do you?
Speaker 3:live. You know, once you're financially comfortable, how do you get meaning from your life? And there's another study that I referred to in the book that was done by Harvard or that is ongoing. It's an ongoing study on happiness and it started in 1938 and they mainly focus on people sort of at retirement, sort of post-retirement, and looking at the quality of life, and they have found that the biggest issue that people struggle with is not having enough money, it's not having enough relationships, and that's what their advice is If you want to have a happy retirement, invest in relationships now. And so it does talk to this, and that's why I use the term financial health in the title of the book, because for me financial health is about a balance between your money and your life and getting that balance right. And it's not easy, because we do get lots of messages like actually you know, you've made it if you're financially independent at 40.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:You know, a friend of mine last week-.
Speaker 1:Why did you give up for this?
Speaker 3:Exactly, you know, and a friend of mine last week dropped dead, literally dropped dead getting his morning coffee.
Speaker 4:It's a problem yeah.
Speaker 3:But dropped dead from a heart attack at the age of 55. And he's just sort of, his kids are just sort of, you know, gone to university and it's just like now, now's the time to start, you know, enjoying yourself. I agree, and actually.
Speaker 4:I did have a meeting earlier with a friend of mine sort of a nice sit-down lunch, and he owns a marketing agency and he's done incredibly well and he was telling me that some of the best decisions he's made recently were to not take on big contracts. And I said, well, why? And he said because I have enough now and I want to spend as much time with my parents before they pass.
Speaker 2:Very good.
Speaker 4:And you can see how happy it made him just saying that yeah. So I agree, it's crazy, yeah.
Speaker 1:And I think that I don't know very many people that have a financial advisor that helps them with that. You know, yes, you generally think your financial advisor is there to help you make money. Of course it's not just about that. It's about keeping it. It's about enjoying your life and about us knowing what it is that you actually want and where do you see yourself? How do you want to?
Speaker 4:spend time with your kids Understanding who your client is and helping them understand themselves. And then as you say, bringing the clarity of it in. Well, this is what you will need in retirement, or not even retirement. This is what you need to have by this point in your life in order to fulfill what will make you happy, what your needs are.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Thanks, Rob. That was awesome and we can get on to the next C's in the next one.
Speaker 2:Looking forward to it. That was great, great insight, rob. Thanks so much.
Speaker 4:Thank you very much guys the story about your dad. That was wild. Yeah, it is a bit wild Sounds made up hey.
Speaker 3:I'll get the logbook for you, you went back into action after that.
Speaker 4:Thanks for that, rob. Thanks Rob. They were different those days. Craig, they were a little different. Thank you guys. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Cheers. Thank you for listening. If you have enjoyed this podcast and would like to subscribe, please visit our website, wwwgrowthfpcoza. The information we have provided in this podcast is our personal opinion. For more detailed information, please discuss your financial situation with a financial planner.