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What Is Money? A Conversation About Meaning, Values, and Financial Freedom
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Financial planners Jim Crider and Cade Grimm of Intentional Living unpack one deceptively simple question—what is money?—and reveal how understanding it can reshape your relationship with wealth, purpose, and life itself.
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Transcript
Intro
Introduction to Daily Money Discussions
00:00:11
Jim Crider
All right Cade, so you and I, we have the the opportunity and the privilege and honor to talk with people daily about money. And yeah this is something that's not new to us. You and I have both been doing this for about a decade apiece.
00:00:28
Jim Crider
I figured you know people ask us specific money questions all the time, but... the best way to address topics, in my opinion, is to first define the topic you're discussing to make sure there's not ambiguity.
00:00:43
Jim Crider
I can't say that word. It's not ambiguous.
00:00:45
Cade Grimm
and
00:00:46
Jim Crider
There's no ambiguity. I still say it wrong.
00:00:48
Cade Grimm
and Ambiguity, I think.
00:00:51
Jim Crider
Yeah, I think that sounds a lot better than I'm saying. I've never been able to say that word right. Anyways, you're removing that that level of of lack of clarity in what you're discussing.
00:01:03
Jim Crider
So
Understanding the Concept of Money
00:01:03
Jim Crider
oftentimes, like conversations... can sound silly. I was actually the talking to a really good friend of mine on a somewhat heated debate topic. And I asked him to define a something that seemed very simple.
00:01:17
Jim Crider
And he he got sort of frustrated at first and said, Jim, like I don't know why you're asking me that. I feel like that's a low blow. i had to tell him like, well, if If we're debating about a peripheral topic that relates to this this this anchor topic, we have to make sure that we are at least consistent in the anchor topic. That way, as we get out further, we know what we're referencing.
00:01:37
Jim Crider
So anyways, sort of a long monologue there. but uh, if these conversations over time get into, and more new one nuanced places of, money and finance and all these other areas, I think it's important that we start off with defining what is money and why these conversations are important and how we anchor in these conversations and things like that.
00:02:03
Jim Crider
Anyways. Uh, yeah, that's, I think that'd be, that'd be a good good conversation today. It's just to discuss what is money and, uh, how we got into why you and I like to talk about money and how we approach our conversations with the people we get to work with.
00:02:21
Cade Grimm
Yeah, I think the question, what is money seems like seems like a really simple or obvious question, but it's it's not, I would imagine most people have never stopped and asked themselves that question.
00:02:34
Cade Grimm
But It seems like an odd question to ask, but like you said, it's really, it's an important question to to dive deeper into other topics that are anchored into money. You have to understand what money is.
00:02:48
Cade Grimm
So yeah. it reflecting on that what seems like a very simple question is important and a good spot to
00:02:59
Jim Crider
Yeah, know I've referenced this before in other podcasts and stuff I've been on. been on But the the question like, what is money? Again, it seems sort of silly at first. And that it's sort of like asking a fish that's surrounded by water all day, like, what is water? It's like, what do you mean? I live in water. I use water all the time. I'm familiar with water. I i
Approach to Financial Planning
00:03:16
Jim Crider
can swim like a fish.
00:03:18
Jim Crider
But, you know, that seems silly until you realize that you're a fish that's living in very unhealthy water. Maybe you're you're you're living in the ocean, but right where a toxic waste dump pumps water.
00:03:33
Jim Crider
materials out into the ocean. And if you're living in that environment and you say, well, what is water?
00:03:35
Cade Grimm
Mm-hmm.
00:03:37
Jim Crider
Why why would you ask me that? Of course, I know what water is. But if you don't recognize that, wait a second, water is supposed to be XYZ. It's supposed to contain these elements and anything outside of that is polluting the actual pure elements of what water is. And until you recognize that you might not recognize that one, maybe, maybe the the thing that we're swimming in is not pure water. And maybe we're interacting with water improperly.
00:04:00
Jim Crider
So again, I would, I would argue that we want to define like, what is money? And I would, I would argue that we wanted to find money from a, uh, uh, a qualitative and a quantitative side of things.
00:04:13
Jim Crider
And as we approach the, how we even help people with their money, you know, we help people with with qualitative sides of things, navigating conversations and healthy, healthy relationship with money, healthy relationships with each other in relationship to money.
00:04:27
Jim Crider
And then also the the more quantitative side of things of helping with, you know, managing investments and tax planning and these, these more normalized things of financial planning. But those are, they're not unrelated by any means.
00:04:40
Jim Crider
And unfortunately, most people, when they dive into money conversations or any type of quantitative type of planning or conversation, they immediately go to the nuanced quantitative side of things without first defining and articulating the objectives and the, I guess, more of the atmosphere they're playing in, you know, like all right, we're going to we're going to help you with XYZ related to your money. They immediately go to, you know how do we manage our investments?
00:05:11
Jim Crider
for Or how what stocks do I pick? Without stopping to ask, well, what is important to you? What's the timeframe?
00:05:17
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:05:17
Jim Crider
What's the need? you You bypass most important stuff.
00:05:21
Cade Grimm
Yeah, you jump straight to action. And like you said, you focus on the quantitative. you You have a really good definition for money. i don't i don't have a definition that's better than yours, but and I'm sure you're going to say yours in a moment. But I know i think when most people think about money, they likely just think about how they interact with it every day. you know it's It is a medium of exchange. you know I'm exchanging my dollars for this product.
00:05:46
Cade Grimm
And most people have never thought about money much beyond that.
00:05:51
Jim Crider
Yeah, I think that's where confusion comes in. Of you know of course, we we argue about money or of course money is these dollar bills my wallet. And well, wait a second. Why is why is my use of a credit card also money?
00:06:03
Jim Crider
Most people don't even stop to think about that. Like, okay, well, if if dollars in my wallet is money and then my visa, when I swipe it, that's money as well. Okay, then what is the actual substance that makes each of those things money?
00:06:16
Jim Crider
And yeah, it's stopping to ask what is money. So yeah those those around us, so you and I, obviously we talk daily and then we have other people here that we work with Intentional Living that have the the privilege or lack thereof of hearing hearing you and I talk all day, every day, and it's usually about money. So, you know, Jack and Bob and and you, you all hear these these things over and over again, and things you'll, you know, other people hear us say is, you know, what money is.
00:06:45
Jim Crider
And my my loose working definition of money is money is a means of communicating, storing, and transferring value across space and time. So again, money is a means of communicating.
00:06:56
Jim Crider
So how you use your money, one, communicates what you value. And again, we can take this out qualitatively. So if I use my money for you know putting a roof over my family's head and feeding our our family, I am i am i'm communicating that health and protection is important to me.
00:07:16
Jim Crider
And if I use my money for I don't know, to go buy a sports car, I'm communicating that that sports car is really important to me. So it's a means of communication.
00:07:26
Jim Crider
Now that's that's somewhat qualitative, but then you could have a quantitative side of things and more the more technical side of how money communicates.
00:07:29
Cade Grimm
you.
00:07:33
Jim Crider
And then we can get into economics and how money is a medium of exchange. And it's a, and instead of having bartering system where, you know, 500 chickens equals one cow,
00:07:46
Jim Crider
Those are means of communicating the value of each animal. Then money steps in as a third party and it represents the value of each of these goods that are in transaction. And it it is the means of communicating value overall.
00:07:59
Jim Crider
So it it makes for ease or facilitation of trade.
00:08:00
Cade Grimm
Mm-hmm.
00:08:03
Jim Crider
So i that's I think where we want to go in these these conversations is diving into what is money in a more nuanced way. And over
Aligning Financial Decisions with Life Values
00:08:10
Jim Crider
time, we'll get more specific and then we'll get more specific overall in our interaction with money.
00:08:18
Cade Grimm
Yeah, I think that's good. i we we We talk a lot and often hear that you know money is a tool. It is a tool to help you do the things that are important to you in life.
00:08:30
Cade Grimm
But yeah, I love love your definition, that communicating, storing, and transferring value across space and time. Yeah, let's let's continue. Let's talk through
00:08:41
Jim Crider
Again, so as as you and I, obviously see our job is to help people with their money and people ask us all the time, so what is it that you do? My general response is a few fold. Well, one, our foundational job is to help you articulate what is important to you in life, and then help you use align and use your money for those purposes in the most efficient and effective way.
00:09:04
Jim Crider
That is what I would say our job is. So there's the articulation of what you value and the alignment of your resources, your money, your time, your job, your business relationships with what it is you say you value.
00:09:17
Jim Crider
and we'll get into this a little bit more, but just talking through, again, money communicates. And the way that we use our money, the way that we use our time is certainly a means of communicating what you value. i think that's where, why money can be so polarizing or such a high means of of fighting is because,
00:09:36
Jim Crider
hey, you you say that this is important to you with your words, but your calendar and your checkbook are communicating something different. And your time and your money are definitely means of communicating. So if we don't have consistency across your words, your money and your time, it's gonna send mixed signals and it's gonna lead to a lot of frustration.
00:09:54
Jim Crider
and So again, that's what we do is we help people articulate what's important to them and then align their resources, primarily their money, but other resources as well with what they but they say that is important to them.
00:09:54
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:10:04
Jim Crider
We hold them accountable to those things. And also another catchphrase that Jack and Bob and our clients, they they hear say all the time is outside of our jobs to help you articulate what's important to you and use your money for that.
00:10:18
Jim Crider
It's also like we live anywhere and everywhere that your life and your money intersect. And that's really what our job is. That's why you know the name of our company is called Intentional Living. It's this place of making intentional decisions anywhere and everywhere that your life and your money intersect.
00:10:32
Jim Crider
But again, to do that properly, I would argue that we need to start with your life and the articulation of what you value. So then we can make sure that your resources are being aligned with that. not by vice versa. And unfortunately, a lot of people, they dive in too far with the money side of things and suddenly their life has to conform with what their money is going towards.
00:10:42
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:10:48
Jim Crider
And we'll, we'll get to that when it comes like debt and rigidity with lifestyle because of money rigidity, and the over-influenation of the money side of things, uh, with neglect to the life side of things.
00:11:01
Jim Crider
That was quite the monologue. I'm sorry. you have any thoughts there before we, uh, I guess get going into more specifics? Yeah.
00:11:06
Cade Grimm
Yeah, I think, you know, what you mentioned, the importance of articulating what's important to you, you know, as an individual. And if you have a family, your family, your spouse, everyone together, like what's important to you individually, what's important to you as a family.
00:11:21
Cade Grimm
And I feel like. and aligning your money, your resources with those things. I feel like a lot of the times spouses in particular, especially if there's historically been conflict about money, if they, if, if they were to take the time to have a, a deep conversation around their values and understanding like, Hey, what's actually important to us.
00:11:44
Cade Grimm
Most of the time, they're they're probably trying to do the same things. They're just going about it a different way. You know, like if if there is, if one spouse tends to be a saver and one and the other is a spender, maybe the value that they're both trying to communicate is I i want to spend more time as a family.
00:12:04
Cade Grimm
But one spouse is doing that by spending money now on trips and on going out to eat and things currently that the the saver spouse views as why are you blowing all of our money? Like, this is crazy.
00:12:20
Cade Grimm
The saver spouse, they're trying to accumulate wealth so that their vision one day is to maybe retire and then go on trips and spend a lot of time as a family.
00:12:31
Cade Grimm
So they both have the same value of, I want to spend time with my family. They're just doing it a different way. And they've never, because they've never stopped to have a conversation about it, it comes off as like their enemies in that situation.
00:12:47
Jim Crider
Yeah, I think i'll like I want to get in that, like unpack that more deeply. Let's do that in our next conversation as far as like money in relation to marriage.
00:12:57
Jim Crider
i mean that's That's a large reason I got into the personal finance space is money and its its contribution to divorce and personal stress.
00:13:02
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:13:06
Jim Crider
And I think that's a conversation really and we need to
00:13:06
Cade Grimm
yeah
Setting Realistic Financial Goals
00:13:09
Jim Crider
go into and help people start unpacking.
00:13:12
Jim Crider
From a, guess from a philosophical and personal side of things, before we get too deep on like, you know, money's cause a divorce and suicide and, you know terrible things like that. Let's, let's, let's talk through our approach with money conversations.
00:13:25
Jim Crider
So yeah I guess, can you describe how we... go through, like helping the families we work with.
00:13:36
Jim Crider
If we say our jobs to help you articulate what's important to you, you want to just talk through how we do that, and why we think that's important.
00:13:44
Cade Grimm
Yeah. I mean, how we do that, the the first step for any new client here, and I would say it's it's probably something that we do every few every few years with existing clients just because your situation changes a bunch and and and it's worth revisiting this conversation. But We begin with three questions and we call it our homework.
00:14:08
Cade Grimm
So you get the this homework, that's three questions that most people, I guess, when they're engaging with a financial planner, they would expect those questions to be about, you know, my income and my taxes and balance sheet, all these things, which are important, but that's not where we feel like it's best to begin.
00:14:26
Cade Grimm
Those three three three questions that we send are, Questions that really help peel back the layers of what is truly important to you.
00:14:38
Cade Grimm
What do you value, again, individually and as a family? So those three questions are, i don't know, maybe maybe somewhat invasive, intimate.
00:14:48
Cade Grimm
Questions that, again, you wouldn't expect to hear from a financial planner, so they might catch you off guard, but they're extremely important. to for us to take the time to actually get to know you.
00:14:58
Cade Grimm
What do you value and what's important? Because if we don't start there, like Jim said are earlier in the conversation, a lot of people tend to just jump jump straight to action and the qualitative things when it comes to money.
00:15:11
Cade Grimm
they They jump straight into opening an account and you know buying a mutual fund or buying some stocks or whatever, but they didn't take the time to ask themselves the deeper, more important question of why am I doing this?
00:15:25
Cade Grimm
what's important to me and what's the value that's actually driving these actions, these decisions that I'm making, the goals that I'm setting. So that's that's where we begin.
00:15:36
Jim Crider
It's interesting what you find is most people have never been invited to a conversation of being asked these intimate questions.
00:15:46
Jim Crider
And I think everyone wants that. Everyone wants to be known. Everyone wants to know others and to be known for who they are. And that's where we start. Again, if we're going to make the claim that our job is to help you use your resources for what you value in life, how silly would be for us to assume that we know what that is without asking you and really peeling those layers back and just start talking about taxes and investments.
00:16:10
Jim Crider
That's where to we have to go in there.
00:16:12
Jim Crider
And it's it's a place of inviting people those deeper places, those those questions of, hey, I want to know you. And I think people people want that. So again, the questions that we ask are not, shallow. Like, hey tell me tell me six of your goals. Because if you start with goals, what I found at least personally, if you start someone fresh off a conversation is, hey, tell me about your goals. they One, they're usually caught off guard and they're gonna freeze.
00:16:37
Jim Crider
And then oftentimes they will respond with goals they think they should have, or they will regurgitate goals they've heard other people say. So, well, I guess i should i I should retire. I want to retire.
00:16:51
Jim Crider
Okay, tell me about that. When is that? And then they go to, well, I think the average person retires, I guess, about 65. So I'd like to retire at 65. Or maybe, well, 65 sounds old. So I'll i'll do 63 because the average person is 65. So I say i want to retire at 63.
00:17:05
Jim Crider
And that's sort of a harkening back to, well, what's a normal thing? And then another thing is the regurgitation of goals maybe heard elsewhere. And that could be, well, I... It'd be really neat to have a private plane or you know a jet, something like that. And you're just regurgitating a goal or maybe an observation you've made of someone else that you think is successful and they've done neat things. And you just are taking their their achievements or their goals and you're slapping them onto your own and saying, I guess I want that.
00:17:30
Jim Crider
And again, that's, that can be okay. But I think what people are grasping for is they're trying to slap on goals to things that sound like it resonates with what they want.
00:17:41
Jim Crider
And you can't stop there. Cause if you stop there, you're going to start, you're going to pursue surface level things that will change. So in in in my experience, you have to go past those goals and we need to peel that back further to something I would call like values or themes, the underlying narrative.
00:17:55
Cade Grimm
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:17:58
Jim Crider
So values being the things that in that really influence those goals. And in my again, in my experience, goals change. That's totally fine. And I think that's why a lot of people are hesitant to actually state their goals or set goals. you know Goal setting is lot of studies used to show that goal setting, writing out your goals is is healthy in and of itself.
00:18:18
Jim Crider
And that can lead as a high correlation to actually achieving goals is writing them down. But a lot of people are afraid to set goals because they think, well, goodness, if I write this goal down and it turns out that I don't achieve it, or maybe later on in the year or a couple of years from now, I decide I don't want to do that goal, but I wrote it down and now feel obligated to go after it. So I guess I just won't set goals in the first place.
00:18:38
Jim Crider
We have to
Values-Driven Financial Planning Framework
00:18:39
Jim Crider
first remove that angst and that tendency to pull away from goal setting and just point out, it's okay. Your goals will probably change.
00:18:50
Jim Crider
Like Kate, I would venture to say that your goals today are a lot different than they were 10 years ago.
00:18:51
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:18:56
Jim Crider
You know, when you were in your early mid twenties versus your early mid thirties, like Your goals probably look a lot different. You weren't married, you didn't have kids. Like, yeah, in 10 years from now, your goals will look a lot different than they do today.
00:19:09
Jim Crider
And that's totally fine.
00:19:10
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:19:10
Jim Crider
And letting people ease into that. But if we settle there and just say, hey your goals are gonna change, it's like, well, goodness, what's the purpose of setting a goal? In my opinion, the purpose of a goal is to inform the best next step.
00:19:22
Jim Crider
But again, you there could be issue if you stop with goals.
00:19:23
Cade Grimm
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
00:19:26
Jim Crider
So if your goal is uninformed by the value and you just slap someone else's goal on, say, I want an airplane. It's like, well, maybe in a few years I don't want an airplane, but everything you're doing is to pursue an airplane for some odd reason that's not thought through. There's nothing wrong with an airplane per se.
00:19:41
Jim Crider
But if you're if you just take that as the primary objective, you're probably going get burnt. So we have to go further than that. All right. what's What is the underlying value?
00:19:51
Jim Crider
So again, we have a flow chart in a sense of how we view these conversations. We anchor that values, goals, decisions, actions. So values influence goals.
00:20:01
Jim Crider
Goals are means of informing the proper action but before we can take action we need to discuss the decisions the opportunity cost uh if you can have anything you want in life but just can't have everything you want in life if you choose one thing you will give give up another thing so we want to make sure that we're proactively making those decisions or at least understanding when the decision is is on the table how do you think you should react and will react So that's our flow chart is values, goals, decisions, and actions. If you've done a good job at articulating values and and establishing goals and understanding the decisions you'll have to make, when it comes to action, it should be relatively easy or simple.
00:20:36
Jim Crider
Not always easy per se to take the action, but you'll have less conflict. You're not go to be sitting there hesitating or as much because you'll already stated, here's what's important to me. Here's why it's important. Here's the thing that, here's the more,
00:20:51
Jim Crider
tangible thing that I'm going to do or that's related to that value. I've already thought through things will probably come up decision-wise. I need to start taking action. Boom, boom, boom, and just go.
00:21:01
Jim Crider
So it's way more efficient.
00:21:01
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:21:02
Jim Crider
Yeah.
00:21:03
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:21:04
Jim Crider
So going back to those values, you want to like, of of course we start there.
00:21:04
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:21:10
Jim Crider
Yeah. I just talked a whole lot. You have any any thoughts? Yeah.
00:21:14
Cade Grimm
No, you're good. I know. i agree. I think i think most or a lot of people, I'll say, set arbitrary goals. and Like you mentioned, they're regurgitating goals that they heard somewhere else. It's like, that sounds kind of cool. I think I want to set that goal for myself, too.
00:21:29
Cade Grimm
Yeah. And I would imagine, I don't know the specific statistics on this, but I would imagine for people that the set goals that aren't anchored into their own values, there's probably not a lot of follow through.
00:21:44
Cade Grimm
Probably not not many of those goals actually turn out to be accomplished because it's not that goal is never anchored in anything you value to begin with. So you end up just wasting a bunch of time and resources and
00:21:53
Jim Crider
Yeah.
00:21:56
Cade Grimm
If you had just taken that, maybe maybe by by chance, the goal that you saw somebody post on Facebook and you have decided to adopt, maybe that also happens to be aligned with something that you value. So that will turn out okay.
00:22:11
Cade Grimm
But yeah, it's it's really important. Really important first step to to understand, hey, what do I value before I start doing these, you know, setting goals and making decisions and taking action?
00:22:22
Jim Crider
Again, that those questions, as I was we sort of getting to earlier, I was talking through how most people are never invited to those conversations of, hey, like, what's really important to in life? And, you know, I guess think for yourself, like, when was last time someone asked you question like that?
00:22:38
Jim Crider
Like, hey, what is, what do you value most in your life? It's very rare. let alone like, hey, Cade, what do you want to achieve in the next 12 months?
00:22:43
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:22:47
Jim Crider
You know, you probably get asked that routinely, probably by your buddy who reads a ton of self-help books or something like that. But when was last time someone really stopped and asked, hey, what's really important to you in life? How do you want to
Financial Desires and Moral Frameworks
00:22:56
Jim Crider
be remembered? And they pause to give you time to think and respond.
00:23:00
Jim Crider
It's incredibly rare, but really important. And I think that's that is that we need to start with that. And I'm not saying, well, here, not goingnna I'll go into what I'm not saying in a minute. I want to finish what I'm actually saying.
00:23:12
Jim Crider
I'm always saying, what I'm saying is that's really important. And we want to make space and time for that. Because if we're going to allow that to influence your goals and allow your goals to influence how we're going navigate those decisions and finally the actions we take, would be foolish if we skip that part.
00:23:27
Jim Crider
Now, I do want to be clear on what I'm not saying. I'm not saying that what you say is important or your goals themselves should always be pursued.
00:23:40
Jim Crider
I'm not saying endorsing that your desires are always right. I'm not endorsing selfishness. I'm not endorsing always follow your heart.
00:23:52
Jim Crider
and I'm not endorsing that, hey, whatever whatever I want is is always right and is always important. Just because you want something in life, just because you think something's important, just because you value something does not make it okay, necessarily.
00:24:09
Jim Crider
So you have to go further than that. You know, that's, that's an interesting part of our job is asking people like, Hey, what's important to you? And if someone says something that's important to them, that's actually harmful to them or, or society or their family or their kids or their spouse, like that's interesting part of us navigating those conversations.
00:24:23
Jim Crider
And sometimes that requires calling them out like, Hey, this, you said that you want to do X, Y, and Z, but that doesn't make sense in context of, of what you, your moral framework or,
00:24:23
Cade Grimm
Mm-hmm.
00:24:34
Jim Crider
the moral framework of our society or let alone like the moral framework of how we view influenced by our Christian perspective. that's That's where things get really, really, really interesting. I mean, we'll get to this further in like probably a specific goals conversation.
00:24:49
Jim Crider
But just to keep things high level, a few years ago, my wife, her name's Kendra. You know that, Cade. Kendra and I were talking. And a goal that Kendra had for a while, and again, this is that this the sort of a problem-related goal. And we did take the conversation further than this.
00:25:03
Jim Crider
But for a while, she said, man, i really i think I want to start homesteading. So I want to get some acreage. I wanna get some chickens and some goats and some go and all these things to sort of get off grid a little bit.
00:25:14
Jim Crider
And finally, after this this conversation became a little bit more serious, I posed to her and I had to remind her, Hey babe, you said that you also, we want to start spending our summers in the mountains where it's cooler.
00:25:26
Jim Crider
And I don't want to get a bunch of, I don't want to have to stay in Texas from May through August to take care of a couple of goats. Uh,
00:25:38
Jim Crider
we can't escape. So we had these conflicting goals. And of course, that's a very lighthearted example. But just because you have something, you have to consider those those those tradeoffs, opportunity costs, the decisions.
00:25:49
Jim Crider
Sometimes those decisions are obvious and they just conflict. And sometimes it's like, hey, that's an unhealthy goal. That's not good for you. It's not good for society or whatever. And again, you could argue like, Jim, that youre that's judgmental. I would say that, well, if you're saying that I'm judgmental, that's a judgmental statement right there.
00:26:04
Jim Crider
So there are there are healthy parameters of judging.
00:26:05
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:26:07
Jim Crider
And it's a matter of how are we judging? Am I judging improperly? Am I judging in unhealthy way? Are we judging properly? So anyways, I know it's that's an odd place to take this conversation, but I would feel, I'd be remiss if I did not bring that up. And I i don't want people to think that if someone brings up something that is obviously unhealthy, that we're going to fully endorse what they're trying to achieve.
00:26:29
Jim Crider
simply because they said it's important to them. Everything you say is important to you. Everything you want is not necessarily great. So we want to get into that further. Why is that important? That's again, we have to peel layers back.
00:26:38
Jim Crider
I want to do X, y Z. Why? Tell me about that. Why is that important to you? How, how will that, how will that, how does that align with what you said is important to you And this goes back to Cade that the, the statement of financial
Accountability and Reflection in Financial Planning
00:26:51
Jim Crider
purpose. Do you want to like, just talk about that right quick?
00:26:54
Cade Grimm
Yeah. I mean, so all of our clients, we have them give us a statement of financial purpose, which is it's a one sentence mission statement for your money. So they they complete the sentence that we or I desire financial independence so that.
00:27:11
Cade Grimm
And that financial, the the statement of financial purpose is there so that as things come up in our relationship and they are trying to decide, you know, hey, should i should I do this thing or should I purchase this product or whatever the decision that they're trying to navigate might be, we can come back to,
00:27:31
Cade Grimm
hey, let's let's revisit your statement of financial purpose. Is this decision that you're making, is it aligned with what you originally told us, is ultimately the most important thing to you and and why you are...
00:27:42
Cade Grimm
why you are are setting off on this journey to to begin with is your statement of financial purpose, your ultimate your ultimate why. Is this decision you're making aligned with that?
00:27:54
Cade Grimm
And if it's not, then we need to have a deeper conversation around maybe your financial purpose has changed and we need to have a conversation there. Or if this decision you're trying to make is not aligned with what you've said is ultimately really important to you, then maybe it just helps to make those decisions much easier.
00:28:14
Cade Grimm
It's easier to say, no don't do that thing because you said this was ultimately the most important and why you're doing all this. This clearly doesn't align with that. So so no. Yeah.
00:28:26
Jim Crider
Yeah, i view I view that as almost a self-invoked accountability measure. Like, okay, this this in summary, after going through those values conversations, the cut the goals conversations, the decisions conversations, all of these things, we're gonna come back and we're going to try to summarize this in one statement as an accountability measure.
00:28:30
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:28:44
Jim Crider
And that will be the lens through which we we view and we we think through money decisions.
00:28:45
Cade Grimm
Mm-hmm.
00:28:51
Jim Crider
And again, if if it doesn't fit through that lens, if it doesn't align with that, then it's meant to be accountable. Like you're you're supposed to be accountable to that. Either what you said is important to you in that statement was either a lie or or off or or we need to think through the decision you're making right now and maybe realign that.
00:29:10
Jim Crider
And i think that's why it's important to go past, again, going past goals, going into the values is to dig deeper and think through ultimately what's important to you.
00:29:12
Cade Grimm
Thank you.
00:29:17
Jim Crider
Why is that important? so you don't just go off on on talking about goals. Yeah. I know we've talked a bit today, sort of redundant in a sense, but I think it's a good place to start.
00:29:27
Jim Crider
Again, if we're gonna talk through like how to use your money, we have to start talking with like, what is money?
00:29:29
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:29:32
Jim Crider
And what is money can be qualitative, quantitative and I think it's a good place to start is just how do we even approach conversations around money itself? And again, we have to get past how do you use your money?
00:29:44
Jim Crider
Again, how do you use your money? What is it? So how do you how do you want to use it? They have to go past goals. You have to get into these values, at this place of articulating what's important to you.
00:29:55
Jim Crider
That way it can trickle further from there in any efficient and effective manner to support what you say that is important to you. So that's that's how we approach things. so Okay, thanks for hanging in. Yeah, if you could...
00:30:06
Jim Crider
want end each episode in a, guess, in summary, and then also sort of lighthearted. So let's let's, we can give each other two questions.
00:30:13
Cade Grimm
OK.
00:30:16
Jim Crider
So we can take turns on the first question. It can be anything related to this conversation today. So my, I guess my question for you would be, hmm.
00:30:28
Jim Crider
How,
00:30:32
Jim Crider
you know, trying to think like a, too long, didn't read tldr type of a have a thing. So could you in summary, the framework of how we try to get people to articulate what they value on an individual basis?
00:30:55
Cade Grimm
yeah, I would say it starts with those questions. The, those, those three questions that we asked to, to, I guess, force a a moment of deep thinking about what truly is important to you in life.
00:31:11
Cade Grimm
And I think sometimes the easiest way to do that is just to continue asking why, peel back the layers farther and further. if if you go to, if if you if if someone asks you what's important to you in life and the first thing you think of is, I don't know, having a having a second home in the mountains, it's like, okay, why?
00:31:32
Cade Grimm
Well, because I love the mountains and I live in a hot area and escaping to the the cool, dry air sounds great. Okay, well, why? And just keep asking why until you can't ask why any further. You'll eventually land at, okay, what's what's the value? what's the What's the motivation behind
00:31:51
Cade Grimm
this thing I originally said was important, it will help you get down to the root of what what really matters. So I'd say kind of forcing deep thought into what what you value before and kind of forcing pause before people do what feels natural, which is jumping straight to setting goals and taking action on them.
00:32:17
Jim Crider
Yeah, I think people want to take action. it's It's a matter of like, let's let's take a second so we can take the action well versus wasting resources, wasting time, wasting energy, wasting money, wasting you know hurting relationships.
00:32:22
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:32:27
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:32:32
Cade Grimm
Yeah. And all all of that waste and hurt comes from, and i would say, not taking the time to to ask yourself that question
Wrap-up and Lighthearted Conclusion
00:32:41
Cade Grimm
or those questions about, you know, what what truly matters to me.
00:32:50
Jim Crider
What kind of, what do you have? What question do you have for me Again, sort of a summary point of the conversation.
00:32:55
Cade Grimm
Yeah, I guess. I mean, we talked about a lot. I think the theme was anchored into that whole values discussion and why that's important. But what what would you say if someone took if someone were to take one thing away from this conversation?
00:33:12
Cade Grimm
What would you want that to be?
00:33:16
Jim Crider
I'd want that to be, for you to routinely pause and actually consider what's important to you. think that's a big that's a big issue I've observed is most people just are there.
00:33:27
Jim Crider
One, most people just go through life yet responding, not even not even being proactive with their decisions.
00:33:32
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:33:34
Jim Crider
It's truly just response mechanisms to everything they do.
00:33:37
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:33:38
Jim Crider
Some people set goals, so they're not necessarily just responding. They are being proactive in a sense, but very, very few people stop to ask, why do we even have those goals? What is important to me? So that's my biggest thing is stop.
00:33:50
Jim Crider
Take a moment. Do this routinely. To ask yourself, sit down if you're if you have a spouse, sit down with your spouse, ask them, hey, what's important to you? Again, people want to be known. you know you should you know If you care so about someone, you should want to know them, and everyone wants to be known, so stop and Heck, even get to know yourself.
00:34:08
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:34:09
Jim Crider
Start asking those those those better questions and do that do that regularly.
00:34:16
Jim Crider
Cade, I guess let's let's do a sort of a silly question before we take off.
00:34:17
Cade Grimm
That's good.
00:34:20
Jim Crider
So i as you're aware, I have four young kids and they're getting to a fun phase because now they ask questions like this all the time.
00:34:20
Cade Grimm
OK.
00:34:25
Jim Crider
So I've got a whole slew of them. So Atticus, my seven-year-old asked me the day, he said, dad, would you rather be able to fly or transport, like be able to like there's transport anywhere in time or sorry, anywhere in so like anywhere in space, not time.
00:34:42
Cade Grimm
Hmm. That's a good one, Atticus.
00:34:46
Jim Crider
Or teleport, that's what I'm looking for. So fly or teleport.
00:34:47
Cade Grimm
Fly or teleport?
00:34:52
Cade Grimm
I think...
00:34:55
Cade Grimm
Without spending too much time, i think i would i would say I would say, because sometimes I can. like I'll sit and you know when we end this call, I'll probably go sit down and think about this deeper.
00:35:06
Cade Grimm
but Probably fly. i really like eagles. There's an eagle in the... painting behind me. I really like eagles and birds of prey and just watching them fly I think looks like a lot of fun and so yeah I would say fly, rather fly.
00:35:28
Cade Grimm
Instead of posing the same question back to you, I don't i don't have as I don't have a running list of strange questions. My son, Jameson, is he's only two. So he's not his questions don't make any sense.
00:35:41
Cade Grimm
And I don't even know what he's saying most most of the time. I guess I would ask you what. If you could instantly master one skill, what would it be?
00:35:53
Jim Crider
wow
00:35:56
Jim Crider
I think if I could, it'd have to be something musical. I wish I could sing well. I love to sing and I sing regularly.
00:36:02
Cade Grimm
Oh, man.
00:36:03
Jim Crider
If I had, if I could just sing in just amazing voice, you couldn't shut me up. I would be singing nonstop. And I guess if it's a skill, I don't if singing is, we can say it's a skill or just a talent by birth.
00:36:13
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:36:16
Jim Crider
I'm naturally not talented by birth for singing. So it was that skill. but if If I could really do it, it'd be like singing along with piano.
00:36:21
Cade Grimm
think it's skill.
00:36:24
Jim Crider
I would love to be able to do that. Of course, other things like, you know, maybe someone who could, you know, a lot of languages or don't know. But yeah, I would say that, like, I think that's something I would use constantly.
00:36:37
Jim Crider
So it's a fun question.
00:36:38
Cade Grimm
Yep. I do. I use my, I'll say lack of skill singing all the time. So I definitely share that with you.
00:36:47
Jim Crider
What's yours?
00:36:47
Cade Grimm
I'm the classic shower singer and and jamming out in the car and pretending like I can sing a lot better than I actually do.
00:36:57
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:36:57
Jim Crider
what What's yours if you could have any skills immediately?
00:37:01
Cade Grimm
Any skill. Honestly, Bethany, my my wife, which you also know that, Bethany and I talk about that a lot.
00:37:02
Jim Crider
At a master level.
00:37:08
Cade Grimm
and We both give that exact answers. Man, I wish I could sing. I want to be able to sing. But if to give a different answer...
00:37:18
Cade Grimm
You know, during COVID, during the shutdown, I spent some time learning how to juggle and just basic like three ball juggling, which I can still do.
00:37:29
Cade Grimm
i would love to be an expert juggler. Yeah. I see you guys throw in like, you know, five or 10 flaming sticks and they're, that's amazing to me. And it's extremely difficult. I picked up on three ball juggling pretty quickly and tried to get to five ball.
00:37:47
Cade Grimm
And I got to where i could, I think, I think it's called cascading maybe. No, flashing. I got to where I could do a five ball flash where I throw all five of them up in the air and then I catch them all.
00:37:59
Cade Grimm
But I never got to where I could keep juggling all five. And so, yeah, I would say juggling.
00:38:05
Jim Crider
I, I, I'm a pretty decent three ball juggler, but I've never been much of a flasher. I can't, I can't do five. I've tried, I think I've tried it before. The kids will watch juggling videos or whatever. And it's like, yeah, it's, it goes like three is natural.
00:38:18
Jim Crider
Anything above three, i have to totally relearn the pattern and stuff.
00:38:19
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:38:21
Jim Crider
So that'd be interesting.
00:38:22
Cade Grimm
Yeah. The, the, the five ball flash is, it was so satisfying. The, the handful of times I actually did that successfully. And I think twice I got to seven where I was using five balls, but I got to where I tossed them a total of seven times before it all came crashing down.
00:38:39
Cade Grimm
It's like, man, if I could just, if I could do this.
00:38:40
Jim Crider
I've, I've, I've watched these videos on how, like, yeah, when you said flashy, I knew that verbiage. Cause I tried it before and it's just, it's just a mess. So, all right.
00:38:47
Cade Grimm
Yep.
00:38:48
Jim Crider
Well, thanks for hanging out Cade. That was a good, like, what is it we just generally do?
00:38:50
Cade Grimm
Yeah, it was fun. Yeah.
00:38:53
Jim Crider
It's hard to, you know, people ask like, what do you do for living?
00:38:54
Cade Grimm
Yeah.
00:38:55
Jim Crider
It's like, Oh, do you manage investments? Like, man, I, uh, without trying to sound too like artsy fartsy or in the sky, like, We go into these conversations. Like that's probably my favorite part of my job is having these conversations.
00:39:06
Jim Crider
And then if you, if that's important to you we'll be highly motivated to do these other things.
00:39:07
Cade Grimm
yeah
00:39:10
Jim Crider
The more technical qualitative sides of our job or quantitative side of our job, we'll be motivated do that really well. Cause man, now we know what's important to you. We're going to like that, that motivates us. And that obviously would motivate you as well.
00:39:21
Cade Grimm
Yeah. Yep. See you,
00:39:21
Jim Crider
So thanks Cade.
00:39:24
Cade Grimm
yep see you jim
00:39:25
Jim Crider
Bye.