Tim Ferriss on ChooseFI Podcast This Week
I published a podcast episode yesterday and my guest was none other than Tim Ferriss.
Tim has been an ever-present in my life the past 18 years through his books and his ‘Tim Ferriss Show’ podcast; it was a real treat to get to chat with him for nearly 2 hours.
Tim has a deep familiarity with the financial independence community, and we discussed what designing a life amidst a massive paradox of choice looks like.
We all have so many options with our time and resources, but how do we hone in? How do we say no? How do we choose who we want to spend time with, and how we spend that time?
I think you’re going to get a lot out of Episode 558 and I hope you take a listen on your podcast player – it is one I’m deeply proud of.
Tim is also a massive fan of board games, like so many of us in the financial independence community.
He partnered with the creators of Exploding Kittens to produce a fantastic new card game called COYOTE and after exclusively being available at Walmart, it’s now available at Amazon (for about $10-$13).
I played COYOTE with my girls and to say we had a fun time is a massive understatement!
You know I’m a board game aficionado, so I don’t say this lightly: The game is great and it’s truly different from anything I’ve ever played.
On the surface it seems like a party game with some raucous fun, but it’s quite strategic and you have to concentrate to keep up with it.
The game only took us about 10 minutes to play and we wanted to keep coming back for more!
I know many of you are looking for game recommendations, so here are most of the games we discussed in the podcast that are favorites of mine:
· COYOTE
· Monopoly Deal (it’s funny that Clint mentions this in the next section…)
· Dominion
· I probably mentioned more like Catan and Ticket to Ride, but not 100% certain
(Note: None of these are affiliate links – I make nothing from these links. Just some of my current favorite games that I think you’ll love!)
A Simple Life
My friend Clint Murphy published a newsletter last Thursday that was so good I had to copy and paste a major section here:
“It's a Simple Life that will help you decrease your spend. That was the biggest takeaway from my trip to Colorado last summer. I was hanging out with the Financial Independence and Early Retirement (FIRE) crowd, and we didn't talk about money at all. We didn't need to. You could see how the habits of financial independence were built into our lives. The easiest way I've come to describe it is we lived a Simple Life. Not simple in the way you think of your retired parents who sit in front of the television until they die, which is something a couple of us talked about on the way home in the airport. No, what I mean is, we kept it simple. · Up early · Morning walks · Grab a coffee and talk · Make a simple communal breakfast · Sit around and have deep talks for a few hours · Head to an afternoon physical activity, often Pickleball · Pick one additional activity per day - say paddle boarding · Sit down for a communal dinner with ice breakers to get to know each other · Have some deep after dinner conversation, play Monopoly Deal, have a beer and to bed early Every day, we were doing 10,000 - 15,000 steps, or more, and we were bonding, having deep conversations and living a really enjoyable life. The cost of the experience? Practically nothing. Seriously, it was that cost effective. Read that list again and you'll see how affordable it is. It's a life that likely saw most of us shed a few pounds, come away with some great life insights and feel rested, relaxed and recharged. So... Why don't we live this way? Well, it's not so simple to live a Simple Life. I've been thinking about this and I wrote a letter to my sons about it and I'll share some excerpts of that here.”
Clint writes a weekly newsletter called The Growth Guide – it’s one of the few newsletters I drop everything to read and I highly recommend it. If you click the link above to read Clint’s letter to his sons, you can subscribe at the same time.
ChooseFI Community Taking Action This Week
My 1% better this week was getting rid of PMI on our mortgage! We had made some extra payments and as soon as we got to 20% equity I sent an email to my mortgage company requesting they remove PMI. A few weeks later they had completed their review of our account and agreed to remove it. It's only $26/month, but to me it feels like throwing money down the drain since it serves me no real purpose. I'm also adjusting our payment to apply the $26 saved to extra principal payments!
- Erika
My 1% is truly ~200x better - grow your own sprouts! Good for your health, and wallet. Recently, I learned that broccoli sprouts are really healthy because they contain sulforaphane, a potent and well-studied antioxidant - plus fiber and other nutritional goodies. So I started buying sprouts, which are quite voluminous, and got annoyed with the high price and excessive plastic (for a minuscule weight of sprouts). $4.99 for a 2oz clamshell With my FI hat on… I decided to expand my home garden to include indoor sprouting, at 1/200th of the cost! The inverted glass jar with mesh setup cost $20, and I treated myself to fancy hand-made Italian ceramic tray for it to sit on for another $20. But ignoring the startup costs for a sec, each batch takes 0.02lbs of seed (2 tbsp). With a 1lb bag of sprouting seeds at $20, that's 50 harvests worth of seed in one bag. It's $4.99(!) for 2oz clamshell organic broccoli sprouts at my preferred grocery store, and one batch of sprouts is 4-5oz! And literally all you have to do is soak them once, rinse them 2x/day, and enjoy! If you too want to grow sprouts, just do the inverted jar method! Remarkably easy. A salad spinner is helpful for harvesting if you wanna remove seed hulls - but completely optional!
- Michael
It's not a huge win but I had a cortisone shot in my back and noticed the place charged for a "surgery tray". It wasn't a surgery so I called their billing office and got $33 off my bill. Needless to say, I'll be watching how my healthcare bills are itemized from now on. Also, I got COBRA reinstated for one month I forgot to pay. So I saved about $500 on a bill.
- Sheila
1% family focus. My 8 year old wanted to solve Rubik's cubes and at first glance I never thought I'd be able. Insert growth mindset. We watched a video series built for anyone, none of the crazy speed cubing algorithm stuff, instead a fun goofy made up proprietary story about daisys, farmers, dogs and abcs to help solve a 3x3 cube for anyone patient and willing to try. We spent over an hour a night following the videos and memorizing the moves and storylines. It was fun, and 2 weeks later I've got it mastered and can solve in under 4 minutes (slow for speed cubers and their algorithm) and my son is about 1-2 more nights away from memorizing the final two moves that he gets hung up on. Fun. Free. And we'll keep working at getting fast. Gotta get the time in while he's in the house and wants to be around us. Link to the video series: https://youtu.be/gXHHhhiSvM4
- Mitch
I work in healthcare (specifically Nuclear Medicine) and was able to get FOUR raises in the last year because of negotiating (and also great leadership). I was offered the opportunity to cross-train in MRI and get all of my training done during working hours. The reason is we have a unique scanner combination of PET/MRI (the more typical standard is PET/CT which we have several of at our hospital). There was only 1 remaining Technologist with dual certification so they needed someone willing to train when I started here. Last spring, I got my standard 3% raise and then in September my supervisor told me that she wanted to give me the next 3% raise early even though I was not finished with training and certification. She said this is the raise I would have otherwise gotten when I completed the training and passed board certification. In December, I took my MRI boards and passed. Woohoo! Then I figured, well I have heard so many podcast episodes with experts explaining how to negotiate and ask for a raise. So... I figured there is no better time than with a fresh certification (even though I had technically already received this raise in advance). I actually used AI to help me start the first draft of my request. Saying how few people are dual-certified in these 2 different imaging modalities, how it helped patients, and how it helped our department and the hospital as a whole, etc. Well, instead of just another 3% raise, I got myself AND MY OTHER COWORKER who is dual certified a new job title (promotion) and a raise. This raise for me was 5% and for my coworker was 10% because she had never negotiated for herself and was apparently underpaid for several years. And now on top of that I am getting my annual 3% raise in the next pay period or so. 3% + 3%+ 5% (with promotion) + 3% Talk about a nice compounding effect! Oh and the best part of this all, is that I left a horribly toxic work environment about 2 years ago to come to this hospital. I would have taken the job even for a pay cut but luckily didn't have to. I have grown so much and am much happier in life (both at work and outside of it) because I am now in a healthy work environment that supports my personal growth.
- Becca
I adopted YNAB back when that episode aired and it's been an amazing tool for me. I started saving right then for this very expensive civilian pilot rating I knew I would need. Fast forward 5 years and I just paid cash for my $15K program with no worries or stress. Many of my friends have not been in so fortunate a position to do this without using their GI bill (which is a very inefficient way to use the entitlement). So I still have my full GI bill to use for our child's college and I have the principles of FI to thank for that. In my 30s I've also saved more for retirement than my parents have over their entire lifetime. We are Coast FI and are now working on the RE. Our kids will be even better off than we are starting earlier to live a more intentional life!
- KJ
Click HERE and let me know what you did to make your life 1% better this week!