012. Frugality is the Enemy of Wealth
Girl, order your damn latte, your avocado toast and enjoy.
In today's episode, you'll learn about the connection between mindset and wealth and the value of making rational, practical decisions rather than ones based on emotions and habits. You'll also learn about the dangers of fixating on frugality and sacrificing present enjoyment when the future isn't guaranteed, plus 5 actionable steps to improve your quality of life TODAY.
In today's episode, we cover the following:
Birdie and Bogey of the Week (1:45)
Old money values: wealth is built by mindfulness (7:27)
The obsession with frugality (8:53)
Mindset shifts when it comes to hoarding and frugality (15:27)
Using rational decision-making skills vs. emotional and habitual ones (23:16)
Increase your quality of life in 5 steps (29:57)
Hot Stock Tip of the Week: Invest in good tea (plus top tea recs!) (33:52)
Transcript
Amber F. (00:02)
Welcome to Old Money, a show dedicated to helping you build the trust fund you wish you were born with. Ladies who lunch, listen up. Life is not about looking rich. I want you to build a life and a legacy that feels rich in every sense of the word. If you're ready to stack cash, talk shop, and trade insider secrets, you're in the right place. These are the new rules to Old Money, so let's get after it. Hello, Rich Girls. It's your host, Amber Frankhuizen. Hope you guys are feeling wealthy and living well. Welcome back to the Old Money podcast. I'm stoked about today's episode. It's going to be a quickie. We're going to get into it. And I wanted to first start off by saying thank you for voting in the polls that I put up on Instagram stories. I guess it'll be last week when you hear this. So I put up some polls about what you wanted to hear more of, what episode length you like. First of all, overwhelming... Okay, not overwhelming, but 55 % of people want me to target about a half hour. So I think that means I'm just going to talk extra super fast, but I'm going to try to keep them shorter.
Amber F. (01:05)
So I really appreciate that. You all also said that you really liked the birdie and bogey, and you didn't think it was taking up too much time. 79 % people said yes, keep it. So I will, and I have a good one for you today. And what we want to talk more about, according to these polls, are tactical money tips like investing and savings. And I have so many of those for you. But second in line was mindset, like the Golden Handcuffs conversation. And like the conversation we're going to have today, which is about frugality and how I hate being frugal. And you're like, Bitch, I know. I see how much money you spend every month. But anyway, we'll get into it. Before we do, let's talk about this week's Birdie and Bogie. The Birdie for this week is that we had the best day on Saturday last weekend with two of our friends, Anthony and Natalie. And as we all get older and people are having kids and we're so overbooked and overcommitted, and we have to carve out time to see the people that are important to us. And so we did that with Anthony and Natalie at L'Auberge in Del Mar, which is this beautiful hotel that I've been going to for years, and I have some really special memories there.
Amber F. (02:12)
But we just went to go use the pool and hang out. And they had their cocktails. I had a burger. I had a million fries. It was a beautiful day just hanging out and making it really easy. And the way that we did that is what my birdie is, which is the app called ResortPass. And ResortPass gives you access. This is not sponsored, but I'm manifesting it. ResortPass gives you access to hotel pools or resort amenities. So you can buy a day pass at many hotels, and then you can go there and hang out like you were on vacation. And the way that I really felt like I was on vacation, I mean, it was just so easy and effortless and floating around and hanging out and having a good time and just being out of your typical environment is such a game-changer for the mood and just to really embody a wealthy life. So if we think about the benefits of being on vacation, A, it's sun, B, it's relaxation and hanging out with people that you love. But it's also unstructured time, and there's something just about being at a pool where you have no agenda, you have no schedule that really makes you unwind.
Amber F. (03:17)
Reading a book, having a drink, whatever it takes, such a hack that you live a very old money, wealthy life on a budget. I love ResortPass. That's my birdie this week. And staying on this hotel and travel theme, my bogey this week goes to none other than Thomas braided. That's right, Tom braided. You're on my bad side now. It has nothing to do with Gisele. It has nothing to do with football, and it has everything to do with Delta Airlines. And you're probably saying, Amber, what in the hell does Tom Brady have to do with Delta Airlines? And you know what? I have the same question because for some unknown reason, he was recently appointed as a strategic advisor to Delta Airlines. Now, say what you will about his football career. It's literally neither here nor there. But the problem is I'm pretty sure we do know Tom Brady's resume because we've been seeing him professionally play football for the last however many years. And not a single time have I ever heard him say anything relevant about the airline industry. But here he goes wrecking it for all of us. Because just this week, a week after they announced their strategic partnership with Tom braided, Delta announced that they were going to be consolidating all of their earnings programs into one new program, which is called Medallion Qualifying Dollars.
Amber F. (04:29)
Just to be clear, it's not clear that Tom Brady is the one who influenced this decision. In fact, I'm sure he hasn't. It's just a coincidence. However, it does feel very suspicious, and if I can make Tom Brady a scapegoat for anything, I will. Because this is what's going down. So people are up in arms about all of their medallion statuses. People are taking trips literally to just earn the miles so they can get these higher and higher rankings within Delta. So they have silver, gold, platinum, and diamond medallion levels, and that gets you access into the Delta Lounges. It gets you priority booking or boarding or upgrades or whatever it might be. And so what they've done recently is they've changed the way that you can earn medallion qualifying dollars to get to these different levels. So where in the past it had everything to do with segments and miles, now it all has to do with dollars that you've spent on Delta products or money that you spend on Delta credit cards. But you get one MQD, medallion qualifying dollar. It's the worst acronym. Oh, my God. MQD per one dollar spent on a ticket price for a Delta flight, or you get one MQD for every $10 you spend on certain credit cards, and then one MQD for every $20 you spend on other credit cards, which are all just Delta cards.
Amber F. (05:47)
So it really doesn't give you the opportunity to be using your other rewards cards to build points for hotels or for other travel perks, or so you can be airline agnostic. So they're focusing all of your spend onto their credit cards. The other thing is they're moving the goalpost of what you need to spend in order to get to these different silver, gold, and platinum levels. So for silver, it used to be 3,000 MQDs. Now it's 6,000. Or it's going to be when they start this January 1, 2024. And it's gone up for gold, platinum, and diamond by, let's see, 4,000, 4,000, and 15,000 MQDs, respectively. The other thing that they're doing with this change is they're limiting how many times you can access a Delta Lounge, which I think is wild because if you are a regular traveler, you are somebody who's spending money on MQDs, on Delta-operated miles, you want to get into the freaking lounge. And I get it. Sometimes the lounge are crowded. In fact, the last many times that we've tried to use any lounge that's connected with any airline or any credit card that we do have access to, there hasn't been room for us.
Amber F. (06:52)
So we've just gone to a different restaurant. But getting that free food, the free water, the shower when you need it, when you're really doing long-haul flights, that's something that's really upsetting to lose. And I think it's really incredible that they decided to release this announcement just after they had signed Tom Brady. So if anybody can explain to me why Tom Brady has anything to do with Delta Airlines, I'm open ears. I would love to learn. But in the meantime, maybe they should hire a new strategic advisor who can figure out a better way to justify their professional experience on their decisions that are being made. But anyway, let's get into today's topic, which is frugality. And I really wanted to talk about this because, again, I want to hark back to some of the old money values that I've talked about before. So if you don't know, I've sat down before I even started recording this podcast, and I figured out what I thought to be 25 of basically the new rules to old money. So all these old money traditions like philanthropy and education and blah, blah, blah, I took my spin on all of them, and I really mapped it out of like, What are my values that I'm following to live this old money lifestyle now?
Amber F. (07:59)
And one of the topics, value number two, was that money is not the only thing that equals wealth. Wealth is the freedom of choice, time, resources. It could be found in the richness of relationships and exceptional experiences. Those are all different currencies of wealth. And as we're on the mission to build wealth for ourselves, that leads me to what I came up with for old money value number four, which I believe to be that wealth is not built by frugality, it's built by mindfulness. And what's different about that is if you were asking somebody like a Warren Buffett, for example, or a real old money family, they would probably tell you that they were frugal because many generationally wealthy families are known for their frugal habits, which helps them live below their means and save for the future. But extreme frugality is not the vibe. And that's what I want to really explore today, because what I'm seeing in the market, in the conversation of building wealth, are two different conversations. The one that I see the most of is skip your latte, and I'm sick of it. We're all sick of it. Millennials, we have been persecuted for our avocado toast for years, and I don't want to have a fucking latte conversation anymore.
Amber F. (09:11)
Those are, as Ramit Sethi says, $3 conversations. I want to be having $300,000 conversations. And when we see frugality in this space, it's usually lauded. People are like, Wow, that's so impressive. You've saved so much money so you can retire early. And yes, I agree, it is impressive. And If you do also want to retire early. But like I said, at what cost? One of the things I've touched on, but we haven't talked about too much, is FIRE, which means Financially Independent Retire Early. And there are a number of different ways to achieve FIRE, but the most common approach is to save a high percentage of your income, invest, and then try to get to a point where you can retire at 35, 45, 55. And there's different levels of FIRE. There's FAT FIRE, which is where you can retire early and live a lavish lifestyle afterwards. There's lean FIRE, which means you're going to retire early, but with an amount that you can lead a lean life and simple life after you retire. And then there's Coast FIRE, which refers to when you have savings for retirement, but you're going to continue to work to cover your living expenses.
Amber F. (10:13)
But the thing is what I'm seeing a lot of the conversation is that people are cutting out all of the enjoyment in their life now so that they can retire early. And I'm here to tell you that tomorrow is not promised. So when you live so frugally and save 70 % of your income so that you can live like a popped or now and live like a baller later, it's just not guaranteed. And I find that to be really, really risky. I think it's so sad when people who work their whole lives for this big retirement, maybe they don't make it to retirement. Or maybe by the time they get there, they might have a lifespan, but they don't have a health span where they can actually enjoy their retirement. Or maybe they've lived so frugally they don't even know how to let loose and enjoy their life or what they've been missing out on all this time. So when I look at people who are very frugal, I ask myself, do I want to suffer on the way to financial independence? Or do I want to enjoy the present because the future is not promised?
Amber F. (11:13)
And if I were Claudia on the toast, I would sing to you, the rest is still unwritten. Because the reality is that we cannot promise the future for ourselves. And if we are suffering now for what we think to be a payout later, it's actually psychologically not healthy for us. So get this. The American Psychiatric Association actually defines frugality as a symptom of obsessive-compulsive personality disorder. I said it, but you didn't hear it from me. Okay, this was the American Psychiatric Association. And basically it means when somebody adopts a miserly spending style towards themselves and others. And on the spectrum, obviously you have normal frugality, I guess, or extreme frugality, which is an amplified version of that, which views spending as a bad thing no matter how much money you have. And that could include choosing the cheaper option even when you can afford better, or just focusing on saving money at all costs no matter how much time or effort you sacrifice. And if you're listening to the Old Money podcast and you have anything in common with me, you could say like I can't relate. Not that frugal. I'm definitely living beneath my means or trying to anyway, but frugality is not something that I'm super-focused on.
Amber F. (12:28)
However, in this frugality conversation, there's other symptoms because fixation, in general, over anything, over budgeting, spending, saving, over shopping, all of these habits are some fixation or obsession, and it is not a healthy condition to be in. And then speaking of just being on this spectrum, and there's so many different ways. And by the way, like I said, I'm not a doctor, but I'm not diagnosing anybody. I'm just exploring here what's a healthy thought, what's a thought that feels good and expansive versus a thought that feels limiting and like lack. And the opposite of lack is having abundance, right? And so some people really lean into that, and it can tend into the hoarding category. And if you tend to hold on to things because you feel like you might need it in the future and won't have it and find yourself accumulating stuff and just having stuff, you might look at it as being responsible because you think saving stuff is money, but it could very quickly edge into that hoarding territory. I think what's so interesting about this too, is people who have a lot of storage space because they're holding on to things that they think have value or they think have sentimental value.
Amber F. (13:44)
Now, if something has sentimental value to you, I get it of keeping it. But I think what people really get mixed up on is perceived value and actual value. We just a couple of months ago, I got a new vacuum cleaner. We have a chow-chow. I'm vacuuming every day, and I'm obsessed with vacuuming. I actually find it really satisfying. And I don't know why it took me so long, but I finally bought a Dyson vacuum. But Justin also had a Miley vacuum, and I also had another upright pet hair vacuum. And so at one point, we had three vacuums in our flat. It was ridiculous. And it's like, Okay, how much should we pay for that Mila vacuum? Probably a shit ton. But what's it going to actually sell for on Facebook marketplace? Not that much. So you might be holding on to something because you spent money in it, but that's a sunk cost. My question to you is, if you're not using something or there's something that's not completely useful to you today, what is the actual utility of saving it? Is it taking up more space than it's worth? What's the actual value?
Amber F. (14:43)
Are you assigning more value to the item than it actually has? So all of these questions are... It's a lot to unravel, but my point is being introspective about our habits with money really do help us in building the life that we want. Because if we are running an unconscious program of saving stuff because I might need that, saving stuff because I might need that, or, Oh, no, I can't go to dinner because I'm on a budget, or, I can't get coffee because I'm on a budget. You start running these patterns. And part of building a new life for yourself is taking control of the thought patterns that are ingrained in us from our own practices, from society, from our parents, and then taking control of the way that we act around money so that we can be in control of our money. And now that's a really interesting thing because a lot of this frugality and a lot of this hoarding or even minimalism on this spectrum that's no longer aligned. It's like a parallelogram of a spectrum. There's a lot of different ways you could be. However, when I say changing your mindset in order to be in control of your wealth building, what I think is really interesting about frugality is that the people that I know that are very frugal, they do that because it feels like they have control of their money.
Amber F. (15:55)
It's an element of control, this fixation and fear. You know, I really believe, and I'm not a doctor, take a shot, I really believe that being really frugal or hoarding is really deeply seated in a psychological fear. And I can understand where it comes from. I mean, especially when you talk about people who grew up in poverty and maybe they were going to bed hungry as a child, and then they're going to want to always have a stalked fridge. I completely understand that. But as they say in personal development, our trauma is not our fault, but our healing is our responsibility. So if you are making money decisions, coming from a place of unresolved emotions, I invite you to look inside and look compassionately about how you're acting. And this is why journaling is so important. So really quick, I just want to pause and say two things. Number one, I started the conversation, I remember I said there's two different vehicles of thinking about building wealth, and one of them is frugality, the other one is about earning more. And that's the conversation we're not having enough and that's the conversation I want to have.
Amber F. (17:02)
Number two, I want to acknowledge everybody that voted on that Instagram poll. You want tactical money tips. But the reason I'm going so hard in the paint with all this mindset stuff is because for me, it's where the change really happened because I was earning a lot of money before. I was earning more money than ever when I was in my corporate job, and I still didn't have any because my mindset wasn't right. And so people think that if they just figure out how to make more money, they'll be happier and better and less stressed. But the reality is that whenever you ask somebody at any income level how much money they need to live, they're probably going to tell you something that's 120 % of what they earned today. Because like I say, there's always going to be a bigger yacht, there's always going to be a bigger jet. And as you grow, your needs and wants are going to grow with you. So if you don't heal that now or you don't take control of that mindset now, it's just going to continue to spiral and be even harder to wrangle later. And the reality is, like I say, we all think that when we have the money, it's going to make us feel better or we're going to feel secure or expansive or loved or whatever that is.
Amber F. (18:11)
But the reality is you cannot have the thing until you become the type of person who has the thing. It's not the other way around. You don't get the thing and then turn into the person. You have to first become the person who can hold the energy of whatever it is that you desire. And so our our goal is to help you get into that mindset now so you can be feeling the feelings of love, of security, of expansiveness, regardless of what's in your bank account. And that's why the mindset is so important. So coming back to the conversation about frugality, the thing that I think is that I only have so much energy in a day to think, to love my boyfriend, to drive my car, to function as a human being, to cook myself dinner, to navigate to the supermarket. Everything that you do takes energy. And when you're focused on these fixations, whether it's hoarding, collecting, coupon cutting, being extremely frugal, managing everything down to the penny in your bank account, you're spending a lot of energy managing things that are arguably detrimental to your wealth building. And when you have more energy to focus on things that are expansive or growth ideas, or you can think creatively, when you free up energy to have more brain power and you have more freedom of thought, all of a sudden you go from trying to hustle a coupon to being like, Hey, I just saw this person on LinkedIn got a new job at that new tech startup.
Amber F. (19:45)
Maybe I should reach out to them to see if they're hiring too, or maybe my service could serve them in some way. You just start thinking more creatively. And what I've seen is that frugality can keep you in a poverty mindset where you're only focusing on how to save significant amounts of money versus focusing on how you can earn a significant amount of money. There is only so much you can do to save money. Like I said, this latte persecution. There's only so many days in the year where you can skip a latte, but there are no limits to the amount of money that you can earn. And I'm talking about career switches or changing jobs, not three % cost of living increases. I'm talking about starting a business, starting a side hustle, investing in something real, like real estate or index funds or whatever it might be because it really is expensive to be poor. It's expensive to be frugal. And I posted this on my social media a few weeks back, and I think it does a really good job of illustrating the expenses to frugality, and also the fact that a lot of people who are in poverty don't have the option to not be frugal.
Amber F. (20:52)
And if you have more options, I hope that you would exercise them in a way that was more beneficial to you. But let me read you a summary of this really powerful quote from Terry Pratchett. It's basically talking about a worker who buys boots. The story goes that this worker makes $38 a month plus allowances, and a really good pair of leather boots cost $50. But an affordable pair of boots, which were okay for a season or two and then totally gave out, were $10. And the thing was that good boots would last for years and years. And a man who could afford $50 boots would have boots for years that'd be keeping his feet dry in a decade. But the worker that only earns $38 a month, who can only afford $10 boots, has to buy a new pair of boots every season. And I think that's really illustrative of a frugality mindset. And I also want to say too, one of the tropes in Old Money families are things like the family Volvo. You have this image of an Old Money family in their L. L. Bean sweaters driving around in Newport, Rhode Island in a beat-up old Volvo station wagon.
Amber F. (21:55)
There is this reverence and respect for people who use really old things until they run into the ground. And on one hand, I'm totally down with that. And by the way, that's why I love a podcast because there's nuance to everything. We have to explore opposing points, right? Sidebar. That's why I hate Twitter and TikTok because it just doesn't allow for nuance. Everybody just has a hot take, and I don't have time for that. I like to explore things, right? Okay, so back to this family, Volvo. It's okay to run things into the ground. It's okay to drive your car until the wheels fall off if you're maintaining it and taking care of things is really great. But on the other hand, if you're driving an old family station wagon around that's from 1985, what are the airbags like? What's the safety rating of that car? If you have a family or a child, you have a duty to them to be driving the most safe car that you can on the road. And I wouldn't ever suggest somebody be frugal for the sake of being frugal or to wear a badge of honor so that they can say they drive an old Volvo.
Amber F. (23:00)
And really quickly, I'm having that experience where if you say the same word over and over again, it does not seem real, like frugal. Am I saying that right? Frugal and Volvo. Those are awful words. Let's just cut them from our vocabulary because they're disgusting. Interesting words. Anyway, again to my story about getting out of financial fight or flight and managing our emotions and our habits and our mindset around money, I think the biggest thing for me about this is that if you're going to be building wealth, it can't be just about more and it can't be just about saving money. It has to mean being mindful. Because when you're being mindful about purchasing anything, you can make it a math equation and take the emotions out of it. And I found when I was getting myself out of financial fight or flight, it was the emotional component that I had to control before I could do anything else. Again, it's okay to want things, but when you want a car for the sake of wanting a car, people call it keeping up with the Joneses, I call it upgradeitis. When you have upgradeitis and you just want to get something new because somebody else that you know got something new, you've got to be really, really careful.
Amber F. (24:05)
But if you want to say, okay, the maintenance cost for this car is going to exceed the cost of a car payment for the next year and insurance and everything else, and it's going to be a safer choice for my family. Taking all the emotion out of it helps you make really good, rational decisions that will help you grow your wealth. Because when you're driving a Volvo and you get in a bad accident and then you get really hurt, and now you're in a way worse position than just having saved a couple of bucks on buying a new car. It's the same thing with buying clothes, for example. Do we need clothes? Most of the time for a woman, not really what we're buying. We've got plenty of clothes in the closet, but it's not really great to wear them until there's holes in the knees of your jeans. We want to have stuff that looks polished and presentable so that we can participate in society appropriately. But if we look at Carrie Bradshaw, who is the worst example of an independent woman in the 21st century and all... Actually, pause. Let's talk about that for a second.
Amber F. (25:04)
I just watched the ending of And Just Like That, which that is the wrong title for the show, by the way. Shouldn't it be I couldn't help but wonder? Isn't that what Carrie always said at the end of the show? Anyway, the show has gone completely off the rails, and Aidan did her so dirty. And the fact that our heroine is now waiting five years for this man to come back to her. And she's saying that Mr. Big was a big mistake, I've never been so offended. I've been so offended when they killed Mr. Big and also basically every storyline that's happened on the last two seasons of the show. But when she said that Mr. Big was a big mistake, I could have screamed. Carrie is insufferable, and her shoe collection and her indulgence in all of her spending with clothes, the worst example I ever could have possibly grown up with. I digress. Carrie Bradshaw is the opposite of mindfulness. Carrie Bradshaw is the type of person who's just responding to what is right in front of her and then using some underdeveloped emotional intelligence to argue a point based on just a current set of circumstances.
Amber F. (26:12)
That's what I'm talking about, of being not mindful with your money. That's a Carrie Bradshaw mentality. And Carrie Bradshaw is not our hero anymore. It is not 2004. It's almost 2024. And what we're looking for is somebody who can embody mindfulness in the investments that they make and they can look rationally at things. What is the ROI on this Veronica beard blazer? Well, I'm going to wear it once a week for the next five years of my life. So the cost per wear, pretty damn good. Or if I'm on my feet all day at work, am I going to invest in a better, more supportive pair of shoes and replace them often so that my joints don't hurt? Because that's going to save my body down the road. So again, using some of these rational decision making skills instead of going into our emotional decision making or our habitual decision making, that's going to be the difference of owning our financial future. And the other thing about this, too, is this frugality conversation is all about deprivation. And deprivation is not an old money mentality. I am not here to be deprived. I am here to live well.
Amber F. (27:14)
And one of the things all the gurus tell us is getting really grateful for what we have, right? So we don't need more. But it's really hard to get excited and grateful about an old, ratty T-shirt and a pair of your boyfriend's boxers to go to sleep in if you're wanting a pair of silk pajamas. It's much easier to get super present, super mindful, and super grateful with one pair of gorgeous satin pajamas that you've invested in. Or are you buying the store brand tea to save a couple of pennies and then when you make it, it tastes like fucking cardboard and you end up not drinking it because it's disgusting. It probably has Carcinogens in it, and you could spend just a couple more dollars for a proper cup of English tea. And every time you made that tea, it was a ritual and a moment that you savored. That's the type of experience that I'm looking for. And quite frankly, people who are always being frugal, they're not having those experiences. It's up to us to romanticize our life and find opportunities to really lean into feeling wealthy now because it's not until we feel wealthy now that we will manifest that money in our bank account later.
Amber F. (28:18)
So again, focusing on the three dollar questions is not going to get you very far, but focusing on the three hundred thousand dollar questions is going to get us miles further. I don't want you to be expending your energy on trying to save so much money or freaking out about things. And I've been there. I know what it's like to go to the supermarket and put things back on the shelf. And when you're trying to budget and you don't have a lot of available money to you, I can completely understand why that frugality mindset can be a savior just to be able to afford food. I totally get that. But as we're looking to grow our mindsets and grow our wealth, it does take getting uncomfortable with some of those unfamiliar thought patterns. It's just like going to the gym and working out a new muscle. It's going to be painful for a while, and it's not going to feel right. But it's rewiring those beliefs that we have so that we can expect a different outcome. I just had a call with a business consultant recently for my own business, and she really helped me identify some of the negative patterns that I was doing and basically manifesting into my life because I was focusing on what I didn't want.
Amber F. (29:25)
So I was coming from a place of fear and lack. I don't want this outcome. And then all of a sudden, I was doing that outcome because I was thinking about it so very much. Instead of coming from a place of desire and having a This is what I want, this is the standard for myself, and this is how I'm going to speak about the things that I'm interested in bringing into my life or into my business, and having a really confident mindset around it. So I'm not perfect at this either. It takes a lot of muscle to get there, but we're going to do it together. So in conclusion, my new position is that frugality is really an unhealthy practice if it goes unchecked. It's wasteful energy. And the cure for frugality is mindfulness. Mindfulness is the key to living within your means, making good decisions on purchases, and living well, because romanticizing your life starts with being really present to your QOL. As Susie puts it, quality of life. If your QOL is low, we need to get it higher. Here's how we're going to do this. I've got five steps for you.
Amber F. (30:25)
Number one, we're going to start feeling really grateful about what we have. But before we do that, we have to purge out all this shit. You have to cut out all this shit from your life. All the things that don't make you feel good. That might mean relationship, that might mean an old pair of pajamas. But I can guarantee you it's going to feel a lot easier to feel grateful about the things that you have in your life when the things that you have in your life are up to your standards. We are going to eliminate the garbage from your life. And I cannot stress how much people in your life influence this. Our next episode is going to be all about boundaries. And oh, boy, do I have some lessons to share? As they say, God has given you these to show others they can be moved. I have all of the scripts that you need to set new boundaries in your life and set standards higher. Number two, create your systems and automate your finances as much as possible. I spend 1-2 hours a month at most dealing with money, and that includes setting up my payments, paying bills, doing all those types of things.
Amber F. (31:18)
I want you to have a life that's not revolved or fixated around money and dealing with things down to the penny. You should be living an expansive life outside of your spreadsheets. The next thing, staying disciplined with your spending by being super-present. That means avoiding unnecessary purchases, sticking to your budget, the cooling off period, using lists like we talked about, using rational thinking, making it a math problem and not an emotional problem. And then number four, being present with your money on money dates. We've talked about this. Calculating your monthly expenses and making sure that they're realistic, making a budget, investing one money a day a month, making sure that you're really present with where everything's going and flowing for you is going to give you the control that you think you're getting by being super frugal or by being a horder or anywhere in the middle that you fall. And the last thing is practicing mindfulness in other areas. This has been a big game-changer for me because the more I get present to the feelings that I wish that I had and my attempt to create them in my present, the more I become my future self.
Amber F. (32:23)
Again, we can't just expect to get money and then become the person we want after we get the thing. We have to become the person we want to be now who can have those types of things. So if you want to be a wealthy woman, you need to act like a wealthy woman. What does that mean? It means taking care of your money. It means making bigger financial decisions. It means taking opportunities when they come to you, it means getting yourself out of a mindset and maybe off your couch. For me right now, it means recording a podcast. When I had the longest day of hell, and I want to come and pour something into myself creatively because that's what the future version of me would do. And I'm hoping that the problems that I had today will resolve when I continue to pursue my dreams to be in my highest creative good. It's a challenge, and it is uncomfortable sometimes, and I'm here to do it with you. So practicing mindfulness in other areas of your life, I think, is so key because it ties back to building that muscle so that you can practice when it counts, like when you're walking into Alice in Olivia and you see the perfect dress that you don't really need, but you think it's going to give you some identity or some wholeness that you're craving.
Amber F. (33:34)
But if it doesn't fit in with your financial goals, then you're going to use rational decision making and math to walk yourself off the ledge and come back to yourself to know that you are enough without the dress. You are who you are. You say you are when you act it every single day, not by what you put on your body. And speaking of ritual and mindfulness, I've been practicing this a lot. I talk about Mimi Bouchard's Superhuman meditations every single time I talk to you, and I'm so annoying with it. So I'm going to give you a new tip today, and that is the tea thing. I've been having a cup of black tea with lunch basically right after lunch, so I don't have it too late in the day. And my tea game is so strong, you all. I grew up with a tea mom. She was not a coffee mom. She only drank tea. So I grew up drinking tea and going to the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park and spending time having tea with her. And a cup of black tea, there is something so posh about having it.
Amber F. (34:29)
And here's the thing. If you're going to have anything, I say have the good version. But a teabag is so inexpensive to really do it right. And my number one pick for tea is Harney and Sons Paris tea. You all, it's so good. It's this really floral black tea with a little bit of vanilla flavor in it. I put one pack of stevia in my tea. It's so decadent and beautiful and floral and aromatic, and it really makes it an experience versus like a lukewarm, limp dick, glipped in coffee teabag. The Paris tea from Herney and Sons is so good. They do loose leaf, they do sashes. I'm obsessed also with their mint tea at night. That's what I drink all afternoon. Mint tea is super good for your complexion. It's really good for your digestion. And then there's also this other tea that I'm obsessed with. My friend turned it on to me when we were in France. You can get it at the market in France for literally one euro. And when I get it on Amazon, it's like eight bucks, but whatever. It's this cheap Lipton tea, but it's so good. It's called Grand Sud.
Amber F. (35:34)
And it's got a little cute camel on front with some pyramids. It's giving Egyptian vibes. And it's this black, licorice tea, and it's such a good wind-down end of the-day, non-caffinated options. Those are my tea picks. That's my frugality talk. Thank you guys for being here. I'm so honored by the feedback that I've been getting from my friends, my neighbors, my colleagues about the things that they're thinking differently about. I'm just so grateful for you to spend your time with me in your ears. Let me know what you want to hear next. Except for next week, we're talking about boundaries and bitch, we're going big. So get ready for that. I will talk to you soon. Bye-bye. Feeling rich? I hope so. Thank you for joining me on this episode of Old Money. If you have questions you want answered, email me at oldmoneypodcast@gmail. Com or hit us up on social. We are at Old Money Podcast and I am at your service. If this episode spoke to you, inspired you, helped you, if you took a single note, it would mean the world to me. If you could please just take a minute to write and review the podcast.
Amber F. (36:42)
And if you're not doing so already, subscribe. And if you have friends who like getting rich, please share this episode with them, even if it's just on your Instagram story. And I'd love you more than Jeff Bezos loves Amazon Pride. Thank you so much, and I will talk to you on the next episode. Remember, I'm not your lawyer, I'm not your tax professional, and I'm not your financial advisor. The content presented in this podcast is intended to entertain, educate, inspire, and support listeners and their personal and professional development and does not constitute business, financial, or legal advice. In addition to that, this episode may contain paid endorsements and advertisements for products and services.
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