Transcript of Jade Warshaw: Break Free from Debt and Unlock Financial Freedom in 2026 | Finance | E380

Today's episode is sponsored in part by Shopify, Indeed, Intuit, Framer, Quo, Working genius, Spectrum, business, and Northwest-registered agent. Shopify is the global commerce platform that helps you grow your business. Start a $1 per month trial period at Shopify. Com/profiting. Attract, interview, and hire all in one place with Indeed. Get a $75-sponsored job credit to boost your job's visibility at indeed. Com/profiting. Start the new year strong. Take control of your cash flow with Quickbooks Money tools. Learn more at quickbooks. Com framer. Com/money. Publish beautiful and production-ready websites with Framer. Get started building for free today at framer. Com/profiting for 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan. Quo is the smarter way to run your business communications. Try Quo for free, plus get 20% off your first six months when you go to quo. Com/profiting. Workinggenius helps you fill gaps in your organization. Take the WorkingGenius assessment and get 20% off with code profiting at workinggenius. Com. Keep your business connected with fast and reliable internet, phone, TV, and mobile services from Spectrum business. Visit spectrum. Com/freeforlife to learn how you can get business internet free forever. Northwest Registered Agent gives you the tools and guidance you need to build a complete business identity.

Visit northwestregisteredagent. Com/yap and start building something amazing. As always, you can find all of our incredible deals in the show notes or at youngimprofiting. Com/deals.

Money touches every area of our life. And a lot of times we think money is just this thing that's in our wallet and that's it. And it buys us things when we want it, but it's not.

In this powerful New Year kickstart episode, Jade Warshaw breaks down the emotional themes that quietly control our financial behavior and what it really takes to interrupt old patterns and rebuild a healthier financial life going into 2026.

Fear, anger, guilt, shame, pity, all of those things, hoping to get to that point of acceptance where you just say, You know what? This is what the journey is. If you're getting raises and your lifestyle continues creep up, you have to ask why.

When it comes to entrepreneurs, what do you think their biggest money struggles are?

It's just the idea of, I know it all. We know everything. When you work hard, you feel like you deserve to spend your money on the things that you want to spend it on. We just want to feel like we're living the life that our work reflects.

What is one truth about money that people don't want to hear that they absolutely need to hear in 2026?

Oh, boy. I could probably tell you a lot of different truths about money, but I think the number one thing is What's up, YAP, gang.

This new year, most people will set goals around money, but very few will keep them. Why? Because money isn't about math. It's about mindset, emotions, fear, shame, avoidance, and the stories you tell yourself. Nobody understands this better than today's guest, Ramsey personality and best-selling author, Jade Warshaw, whose new book, What No One Tells You About Money, exposes the real reasons people get stuck financially and how to break free for good. Before she became a national finance expert, Jade and her husband, Sam, were drowning in over $460,000 of debt. In today's episode, Jade breaks down the emotional themes that quietly control our financial behavior. Behavior like frustration, fear, guilt, shame, and the I deserve it mentality. Jade reveals why most people self-sabotage their budgets, how identity wounds shape money choices, and what it really takes to interrupt old patterns and rebuild a healthier financial life going into 2026. If you're ready to stop repeating old patterns, heal your relationship with money, fix your habits, and finally gain traction this year, this episode will change everything. Jade, welcome to Young and Profiting podcast.

Awesome. Thanks for having me, Hala.

Yeah, I'm so excited for this interview. This is the first interview of the year, and a lot of people are really focusing on their New Year's resolutions. They're trying to figure out how they can make the most money they ever did in 2026. I know from your new book, What Nobody Tells You About Money, that basically it's all about emotions, and it's not really that math is any budgeting problems. It's really the emotions that are driving all of your money problems. Let's start there. What are some of the common emotions that come along with money that block people from actually achieving their goals?

A lot of people, they have the plan, like you said, and maybe they've started wanting to do some of the behavioral changes, but those emotions are huge. One of the big ones is frustration. We're doing all this toil, but we're not getting the traction we want. We're doing all this effort, but we're not getting the results we want. That's going to make you stop faster than I mean, anybody who's ever done a diet or a fitness plan and not seen the results that they want to see fast enough has quit midway through the process. It's the same thing with money.

I know that you are not somebody who just talks about this. You've actually went through your own debt crisis and got over it. You also co-host with Dave Ramsey on The Ramsey Show, and you've witnessed hundreds of people and their problems and all the patterns that they show. What are some other type of emotional patterns that you see see given all your experiences?

Frustration, like I said, was a big one. Obviously, anger is huge, especially right now, Hala, because there are so many external forces that are just infiltrating our lives that have nothing to do with us. My buddy Dr. John Deloney says it like this. He says, It's not by my hand, but in my lap. It's the same thing, right? We feel that with inflation. We have felt that with the housing market. The prices are just insane. Obviously, health care has gotten so high. Because of that, a lot us feel disenchanted. We feel angry at the system. Student loans are another great example of just these outside forces that are really affecting the way we get to spend our money. It's affecting our buying power. It's affecting our ability to save money for the future. And that makes us mad, right? It's not fair that I went to school and I did everything they told me to do. And still, I'm having a hard time paying my credit card down. Still, I'm having a hard time buying a house. So anger is so, so big. I'd say probably of the five we talk about in the book of tough emotions, I would say probably the top three.

So we said frustration, anger. And after that, I would say guilt. Guilt is one that so many of us wrestle with because it's this idea that I've made a mistake with money or I've made maybe a series of mistakes with money, how could I possibly trust myself to do the right thing now? Can I trust my instincts? Can my spouse or partner trust my instincts? And that's a really tough one for people to navigate.

I know that you've went through your own issues. We had mentioned, you were $460,000 in debt. You and your husband were at one point. What were some of the emotional blockers that you had that were preventing you from becoming debt-free and accumulating debt in the first place?

With my husband and I, everything in the book is what we went through. I really like to write from a place of experience. In the book, I talk about five tough emotions to navigate, and hopefully, you'll get to the point of acceptance. They're all the ones that we struggled with. Frustration, like I said, fear, anger, guilt, shame, pity, all of those things, hoping to get to that point of acceptance where you just say, You know what? This is what the journey is. In the book, I talk about it in the same way you'd think about a marathon. For years and years, I wanted to run a marathon, and there was always an excuse not to do it all. It was like, Okay, I'm too busy, or it's too expensive, or it takes too much time to train, or it's going to be too hard on my body. There are always these blockers that would come up and tell me not to do it. Then finally, one day, I was like, You know what? The process is the process. Millions of people do this every year. Am I going to be one of the millions who just bites the bullet and does it, or am I going to keep making excuses?

The time is going to pass anyway. The truth is, the more time I wait, the less advantageous it is for me because I'm only getting older. My kids are still here and they get in the way a little bit. I finally was like, You know what? Let me just do it. The truth is, yeah, it's a process. You have to train every single day knowing that no day is easier than the last. It only gets tougher. Your body, yeah, you do have pains and there are things that you have to endure. Some days are sunny and 70, and other days are rainy and cloudy and cold. There became a point that I just said, this is the process. If I just go through it, the days and the time is going to pass, and when race day comes, I will the finish line. There's no if, and, or, but. I just have to go through the training. The same thing is true with money. When you are embracing a plan for your money, whether it's to pay off debt or to save for a down payment for a house or to save for a business that you want to start, you have to go through that process.

There are going to be times along that journey that you want to quit. There's going to be times where you have the aches and pains of life and things that are holding you back, but you just have to embrace that struggle. If you do, you will that point of acceptance, and eventually you will cross your finish line.

Like I mentioned, we're coming up on the new year. Everybody is looking forward to having the best year yet. What is one truth about money that people don't want to hear that they absolutely need to hear in 2026?

Oh, boy. I could probably tell you a lot of different truths about money because there's so many things that people don't want to hear. But I think the number one thing is it may not have been your fault, but it's your job to fix it. For me, that is the big one because like you said, I take calls from people around the world all day, every day on the Ramsey show. I mean, it's like 18 million folks a week that are listening to that. Everybody's calling in with different types of problems, but the feeling of it is the same. Which is, should I be the one that has to deal with this? It's, well, my spouse, they're not the one doing it. I'm trying to save money, but they're outspending. Or my grandma took out a credit card of my name, or my parents are the ones that told me to sign for the student There's all of this reason that we want to place the blame somewhere else. I had a colleague and a mentor tell me once, he said, You can't blame your way to a better life. It always stuck with me.

You can't blame your way. That's the thing. If we can take responsibility and say, Hey, there might be a very good reason that this sucks. There might be a very good reason. Somebody may have done you wrong, legitimately. You may have been divorced, and now you're trying to rebuild, and it's Or you worked at a job for 20 years and they fired you. All that stuff is real. But at the end of the day, that person is not going to come back and fix it for you. The chances of that happening are so slim, and we spend so much time waiting around for somebody to go, Oh, I'm sorry. Let me come fix that for you. And they're not coming, Hala. You're the only one that can rescue you.

So true. You've got to take accountability. Nobody is coming to save you. You've got to save yourself.

Yeah.

Okay, so there's so many different money trends online going right now. People are talking about girl math. They're talking about self-saving. People really care about finances these days, and they're talking about it online. I wanted to do a fun little quickfire segment Unpacking why you think these trends even exist. What is actually going on culturally that people want to talk about these types of things or are doing certain things differently now. The first one is loud budgeting. This is basically how millennials and Gen Z, they're openly setting boundaries now. If somebody asks them out to dinner, they say, No, I'm sorry, it's just not in my budget. I can't afford it right now. They're happily just telling people they can't afford things and setting boundaries with their money. Why do you think that's happening?

First off, I love that that's happening. I think it's happening because people are tired of going along with the status quo. I think people are finally realizing that life as we know it sucks. This idea, I'm just going to be broken every year and I'm never getting ahead. I think people finally figured out. It's like they used to say back in the day, the revolution will be televised. It's like, we need to know because then you have the accountability. It's you creating that boundary of saying, I can't go, I'm on a budget, it's the me too that you're wanting. Whenever you're going through a hard time, you think it's isolated to just you. But then when your buddy is like, Oh, no, I'm going through it, too. You're like, Oh, thank God. Somebody else is in the same boat as me. So when somebody says out loud, I can't go because my budget, that frees up so many other people to go, Oh, my gosh, me too. I feel broke as well. I'm trying to get my money on point as well. Now suddenly, we can have a bunch of open conversations about it, and it's not quite so lonely.

I wish I had done that because back in the day when my husband and I were paying off debt, not necessarily on purpose, but I didn't talk about it out loud a whole lot until several years in the process. And once I did start talking about it, it was helpful, and it gave me the opportunity to really help other people, which was a benefit for both of us.

I love it. I feel like it's the opposite of keeping up with the Joneses, which is what I feel like I grew up with, and now everyone is just more open about what they can actually afford, which I think is actually really positive and cool. Okay, the next one is a funny one. Girl, GirlMath. This is when people justify what they buy through creative logic. The big joke is that girls do this. If I pay in cash, it was free and things like that.

Girlmath, I've been the guilty of it. I'll tell you I think at the root of that, and I talk about this in the book, is just an I deserve mentality. I think we've all felt it. When you work hard, you work 40 plus hours a week, 60 hours a week, you feel like you deserve to spend your money on the things that you want to spend it on. Sometimes we know deep down, Oh, maybe I shouldn't have bought that. Maybe that was too much. So we justify it with things like girl math. I'm not judging anybody. I've done it, too. But I think that's what's at the core of it is we just want feel like we're living the life that our work reflects, if that makes sense. We're there every day, 40 hours a week. Our time is being spent. It's time away from our family, time away from our kids, whatever. We want to be able to get out and get a little treat and feel good about it. If we have to say, Well, the sign said that it was buy one, get 50 free, then we'll just say that that was the reason, right?

Yeah. What could go wrong with that a mentality? I feel like I do that a lot. I see an expensive bag and I'm like, Yeah, I worked hard. I deserve this. What could go wrong with that?

At the end of the day, we're losing efficiency. The more time it takes to accomplish a goal, the more chances are that we give up on it. I tell people all the time, every little bit counts, every little bit. If we have said to ourselves, Hey, the goal in this season is to save for a down payment on a house, or the goal in this season is to save $20,000 to get that machine you need for your business, then work at it as though that's the number one priority, because all day long, other things are going fight for that top slot on your priority list. That's just the way it is. We've got to get very good at noticing when those things creep up to try to take the top spot. It happens very easily when you're like, Oh, man, this is my goal. I'm saving $20,000. And then your friend is getting married in the Caribbean. You've girl-mapped it and said, Well, if I room with my best friend and every night I order water, and I don't even know if Groupon is still a thing anymore, but we do Groupon for Then you've girl-mapped yourself right out of what you said was the top priority, which was saving $20,000 to start your hair salon, whatever it is.

We've just got to become experts at recognizing when those things try to creep in. The first words to diagnose yourself is when you start to sense or hear yourself say, I deserve. That should be the warning signal. I talk about that in the book. I'm giving everybody ways to diagnose what what it is, what the emotion is that's blocking them, and then I'm giving them the antidote to stop it.

Okay, next trend is quiet luxury. This is when people are showing off very expensive clothes. It might be like a $500 sweater, but it has no logo. So logos are out. It's all about being understated, but luxury. What do you think is actually going on with folks who really care about quiet luxury?

I like that. I think what's going on is they're deciding, if I'm going to spend money, it's going to be for me. I relate to that wholeheartedly because I come from a background where I had to do a lot to try to fit in. You end up doing so many things just to fit into a mold, and you're spending money that you don't have to impress people that you're not even sure that you even like. And that can take many different forms. And for a lot of us, yeah, it was, I'm going to make sure. I remember when Michael Kore's watches were in style, everybody had that giant wristband of a watch. When I was in middle school, you had the Tommy Hill figure. It's a giant logo, everything to try to prove and show. I have the money, I fit in, I belong, I can hang. I think people are getting to a point where they go, You know what? If I'm going to get something nice, I don't have to prove nothing to nobody. This is for me, and it's like a gut check to even do it that way. If you're going to go out and spend thousands of dollars on a nice bag, are you going to get the one that's Are you going to get the logo stitched all over it, or are you going to get the one that you like that maybe nobody's heard of the designer?

I love that. I had a buddy once that said a really good framework for if a purchase is for you, or the people, is if you ask yourself, if nobody ever saw this, would I still buy it? If nobody ever saw the ring, if nobody ever saw the necklace, if they never saw the car, would you still buy it? I think that is such a meaningful practice to have in your own mind before you buy anything, because then you know, am I doing this for status and clout and looks, or am I doing it just for me? If I'm going to make a dumb decision and buy something I can't afford, at least let it be for me and not for them.

Young and profitors. I know there's so many people tuning in right now that end their workday wondering why certain tasks take forever, why they're procrastinating certain things, why they don't feel confident in their work, why they feel drained and frustrated and unfulfilled. But here's the thing you need to know. It's not a character flaw that you're feeling this way. It's actually your natural wiring. Here's the thing. When it comes to burnout, it's really about the type of work that you're doing. Some work gives you energy and some work simply drains you. It's key to understand your six types of working genius. The working genius assessment or the six types of working genius framework was created by Patrick Lencioni, and he's a business influencer and author. The working My genius framework helps you identify what you're actually built for and the work that you're not. Now, let me tell you a story. Before I uncovered my working genius, which is galvanizing and invention, so I like to rally people and I like to invent new things, I used to be really shameful and had a lot of guilt around the fact that I didn't like enablement, which is one of my working frustrations.

I actually don't like to support people one-on-one. I don't like it when people slow me down. I don't like handholding. I like to move fast, invent, rally people, inspire. But what I do need to do is ensure that somebody else can fill that enablement role, which I do have, Kate, on my team. Working genius helps you uncover these genius gaps, helps you work better with your team, helps you reduce friction, helps you collaborate better, understand why people are the way that they are. It's helped me restructure my team, put people in the spots that they're going to really Excel, and it's also helped me in hiring. Working genius is absolutely amazing. I'm obsessed with this model. So if you guys want to take the working genius assessment and get 20% off, you can use code profiting. Go to workinggenius. Com Again, that's workinggenius. Com. Stop guessing. Start working in your genius. Hey, young in profitors. As an entrepreneur, I know firsthand that getting a huge expense off your books is the best possible feeling. It gives you peace of mind, and it lets you focus on the big picture and invest in other things that move your business forward.

Now, imagine if you got free business internet for life, you never had to pay for business internet again. How good would that feel? Well, now you don't even have to imagine because Spectrum business is doing exactly that. They get it that if you aren't connected, you can't make transactions, you can't move your business forward. They support all types of businesses, from restaurants to dry cleaners to content creators like me and everybody in between. They offer things like internet, advanced WiFi, phone TV and mobile services. Now, for my business owning friends out there, I want you to listen up. If you want reliable internet connection with no contracts and no added fees, Spectrum is now offering free business internet advantage forever when you simply add four or more mobile lines. This isn't just a deal. It's a smart way to cut your monthly overhead and stay connected. Yeah, fam, you should definitely take advantage of this offer. It's free business internet forever. Visit spectrum. Com/freeforlife to learn how you can get business internet free forever. Restrictions apply. Services not available in all areas. Happy New Year, YAP, gang. I just love the unique energy of the new year.

It's all about fresh starts, and fresh starts not only feel possible, but also feel encouraged. If you've been thinking about starting a business, this is your sign. There's no better time than right now. 2026 can be the year that you build something that is truly yours, the year where you take control over your career, and it starts with Shopify. I've built plenty of my own businesses on Shopify, including my LinkedIn Secrets Masterclass. It's a two-day workshop. People buy their tickets on Shopify. Then my Mastermind subscription is also on Shopify. I built my site quickly in just a couple of days. Payments were set up super easily. None of the technical stuff slowed me down like it usually does because Shopify is just so intuitive. This choice of using Shopify helped me scale my masterclass to over $500,000 in revenue in our first year. I'm launching some new podcast courses and can't wait to launch them on Shopify. Shopify gives you everything you need to sell online and in-person, just like the millions of entrepreneurs that they power. You can build your dream story using hundreds of beautiful templates. Setup is fast with built-in AI tools that help you write product descriptions and edit photos.

Plus, marketing is built in, so you can create email and social campaigns easily. And as you grow, Shopify can scale right along with your business. In 2026, stop waiting and start selling with Shopify. Sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at Shopify. Com/profiting. Go to Shopify. Com/profiting. That's Shopify. Com/profiting. Yeah, fam, here your first. This new year with Shopify by your side. Okay, next one, de-influencing. This is when creators are telling you what not to buy. What do you think is going on there?

It's like reverse psychology for some people, but I think for others, I do think it's legit. I tried this myself because I'm obviously on social media all the time, and I myself was like, Social media, you got to be careful because it's your time that is on the table. Even as a creator, it's so easy to get sucked in. Before you know it, you're consumed consuming more than you're creating. I even told people, I was like, Hey, as much as I want you guys on here consuming my content, you need to take a break. You need to delete social media from your phone because this is eating up the time that you need to focus on your goals this year. I understand the struggle that is to tell people the truth, but also know that telling them the truth could affect your livelihood. I think in the end of the day, that does build trust, and it makes you not just a trustworthy to other people, but it makes you true to yourself. I love that influencers are de-influencing people, that they're telling people the truth. I think we're living in a world right now that people want the truth.

They don't want you to sell them something. They want you to tell them the truth. I feel the same way with money. Tell me the truth. Don't just give me another plan. Don't just tell me something else and give me six more steps. Tell me what I really need to know. I know I was craving that, and that's one of the reasons I wrote this book, is so that people can get the bottom of it and not have to sort through a bunch of fluff. Tell me the real truth.

So speaking of your book, you talk a lot about engine checklights. You make this analogy that you've got financial engine checklights. What are some of these checklights that people often ignore the most or let it linger for the longest?

These checklights are like what we talked about earlier, those red flags. One of them is, yeah, the I deserve syndrome where it's like, I know I shouldn't buy this, but I deserve it. That's an indicator that you're about to do something silly. Other things that are more financial is, yeah, if you're noticing that your account is sometimes overdrawn or if you're having to switch from using your money to my money is now gone, now I have to switch over to my credit card, that's an indicator that your spending is out of control. If you're a person, and I'm talking about extreme things because I come from an extreme background. If you're a person who is having to ask people to borrow money, if you're a person who is thinking about transferring their debt onto a heelock and rolling it into your mortgage, that's a sign. If you're a person who is living paycheck to paycheck, that's a sign. In the book, I'm going through all of these different seemingly everyday feelings. If you're a person who every time you go out to dinner, if you say, Oh, today I'm going to go to dinner with friends, and before you order from the menu, you're like, Let me just check my bank account, and you're logging in to check your bank account, that's a sign that things are out of control.

You should understand what's going on with your money and be able to spend freely because you understand what's going on with your money. If you have to check your bank account before you have brunch with friends, you shouldn't be at brunch. Those are the types of things that I'm talking about in the book. I'm trying to shine light on these day-to-day occurrences that are really deep indicators as to what's going wrong. It is the same as the check engine light, because when it pops on, Hala, most of us are like, No, and we ignore it. We don't want to see it because in our minds, it means that, Oh, my gosh, I'm going to have to go to the shop They're going to tell me that my entire car is going to blow up if I don't get it fixed today, and it's going to cost $1,800. We've just already told ourselves this litany of excuses of why this is the worst thing ever, instead of just seeing it for what it is, which is a gentle reminder that you need to look at what's going on. If you fix it now, you're going to avoid a bigger blow up in the future.

How can people move from being in that stuck feeling? Because a lot of the times when we feel anxious about something or we know we have to do something, we procrastinate, we freeze, we don't take action. How do we actually get unstuck?

Yeah. So all that you're saying, all of those adjectives that you use, that's fear. It's different types of fear operating in the background. In the book, I talk about several different types of fear. But one of them, and a lot of what you were saying was fear of the unknown, which is I'm stuck, I'm frozen because I don't know what's going to happen next. For most of us, when we get in that portion of life that feels unknown, it's like, Let me stop, because I don't know what's out there. I talk about that in the book, this idea of if I do X, Y, Z, then it's going to equal something that I can't depend on. Just because it worked for this person, I'm not sure if it'll work for me. Just because these experts are saying it, I don't know if it'll work for me. We get into this point of creating these irrational ideas of what will happen next. In the book, I talk about how to diagnose, first off, is your fear rational or irrational? Because there's two types. There are very rational fears out there, and I want to validate that.

But most of us are in the irrational zone. You know when it's irrational, when it's vague, the vague idea of, If I do this, then I'm going to ruin everything, or, If I spend the money like that, then I'll never get to see my family. What are you saying? You'll never get to see your family? Let's drill that down. I'm talking about how to drill down those fears, because if you can drill them and distill them down to what it actually is, then we can actually find a solution for it. I tell people all the time, for example, I'll say, Hey, money is pretty simple. If you need more of it, you can either lower your expenses or increase your income. That's basically it. I tell people, if you're looking for ways to increase your income, yeah, either pick up a side hustle, maybe start a small business. Right when I say that, it's Hold on. You're telling me I need to give more time to this? Well, what if I miss out on my kid's soccer game? Well, what if I miss out on this? Or what if my spouse thinks I'm neglecting them?

And I'm like, Let's distill it down. Tell me exactly. Then We can address it. If you're afraid that you're a newlywed and your spouse is going to think you don't want to spend time with them, then we can solve for that, can't we? We can have that conversation. We can say, Here's what my fear is, because the antidote to fear is light. It just needs to be put out in the open. We can see it for what it is, and then we can deal with it.

Some other emotions that I know you talk about in the book are guilt and shame, and you separate them as two different emotions. I think shame is even worse than guilt. It's like when guilt crosses over into shame. At what point does that happen? Can you break those two emotions down for us?

Yeah, guilt and shame are diabolical. Let me even start at the top because the first one is regret. Regret is like that basic buyer's remorse that we've all felt. You get home, you have the bag, or you get home, and maybe you bought a new suit or you bought, I don't know, you took somebody out for drinks and you offered to pay and you probably shouldn't have done it. You're like, Dang it. I wish I could go back in time and redo that. It's probably not a huge deal, but you just know in the moment that wasn't the smartest thing. Usually, regret, you can brush it off, just chalk it up to hindsight's 2020. But then the next layer is guilt. Guilt is usually when you've done something foolish that, but someone else is involved. This is financially speaking. It's like, I needed to get that car or I needed to get that loan, and I went to extreme attempts to get it. I had somebody cosign for me. Then things went south for me. I wasn't able to make the payment on time. Now it's affecting them, and I feel guilty that I got them all hung up in my situation.

So guilt is when we've done this dumb thing and now other people are suffering because of it, whether it's our buddy or our friends, our spouse, our kids. That feels terrible. Shame is the next level of when it's not just something we did, but now it's an identity that we're owning. So no longer is it the business plan was stupid. Now it's I was stupid. It's no longer that student loan is ruining my life. It's I've ruined our lives. Now you are the mistake. Now you're wearing the identity, and now you're the problem. When that happens, how That is so dangerous because a lot of times it happens in secret, and the people around us don't know that we're carrying that, and they don't know that that's how we're viewing ourselves. We're viewing ourselves as a mistake. We're viewing ourselves as a burden. We're viewing ourselves as a problem. I think that so many people are struggling with that financially because look at the world we're in. There's over a trillion dollars of student loans. There's over a trillion dollars of credit card debt. Same thing with car notes. We're feeling this. We're feeling like we've made mistakes that are irrevocable, and that's simply not true.

This conversation reminds me a lot about what we learn in sales. If you're trying to get somebody to buy something, but they believe they're a person that won't make you They're going to fail at it, or they can't do it themselves, or they're going to fail at it, you need to shift their identity before they're actually willing to buy. This feels really similar. If you need to make a change with your money, you need to actually change your identity and your belief around how you act with money. Can you talk to us about how important identity is with all of this?

Oh, my gosh. Identity is so important because it's our belief system. The way that I try to explain it to people who are trying to get their minds around this concept is I describe it as a vehicle. I'll say behavior is the car. That's where you want to go. Then your belief is what's in the driver's seat. You can say all day, I would love to have the behavior of a person who saves money. You're in that vehicle, you're like, I want to save money. But your your belief is what's going to sit in the driver's seat and push the pedal. If your belief says, But I've never seen people like me become a millionaire, then suddenly your foot is going to take yourself off the accelerator and you're going to go slower and slower. Or if you say, Well, I grew up and my neighbors, actually, they were very well off and my grandparents were millionaires. Well, you have that belief, and so you mash on the gas and you go forward. But then there's another component, which is your emotions. That's the thing that's steering the wheel. You can Oh, yeah, my grandparents were a millionaire.

I can be a millionaire, too. You mash on the pedal, but then you go, Oh, my gosh. But... And your emotions start taking you in a direction. Next thing you know, you've hit a tree. So all of these things have to work perfectly together to take the vehicle to the right destination. And so, yeah, belief, which I would pair with identity, is so, so important because, again, that's what's either going to mash on the pedal or take the foot off the accelerator.

I'd love to go deeper with this and play a little game, a scenario game, where unpack what is going on with this person's beliefs or identities and what do they need to shift in order to make a change and turn around what's going on for them financially. It's called emotional audit. The first scenario is, I make really great money, but I still feel broke every month.

That's going to be frustration because that's a person who doesn't know how to budget, and they probably think they're budgeting the right way, but they're actually budgeting the wrong way. This is a person that makes me It's sad because they've decided that the budget is at fault versus their know-how being at fault. This is the person who goes, I'm not budgeting anymore. It doesn't work. I'm like, Yes, it does work. Let's do it the right way. I tell people all the time a budget has to be detailed, realistic, and flexible if it's going to work. So this person's budget is not realistic, and it sounds like it's not very flexible either. So that's what I would coach them. I'd say, Hey, you're putting the effort in to get the money. Let's create a plan that actually works for you so that when you need money, it's there when you need it. And not only do you have the money to do the things you need to do, but you have some money left over to do the things that you want to do. So I'd call that frustration.

Okay, next one. I avoid checking my bank account because it gives me anxiety.

I'm going to go with guilt. That feels like guilt. Or it could be fear, but I think it's guilt. I think there's something underlying. I'm afraid to check my bank account balance. That's telling me you know there's supposed to be money there based on the fact that you get a paycheck, but there's no money there because you're going out every night or you're taking a bunch of ladies out spending more money than you actually have trying to impress them. There's something going on there that you don't want to expose to the light of day because you're feeling guilty about it.

I've got $40,000 in credit card debt, and I feel paralyzed.

Fear. I'm going to go fear because you're feeling paralyzed. Oftentimes, fear will make you completely stop in your tracks. This is the person who goes, I don't know what to do next. I'm afraid nothing will work. I'm afraid there's no hope. I'm afraid that I'll be in debt forever. It's just so overwhelming that they don't even start. With fear, like I said before, it's so important to get the facts. In the book, I talk about how facts are your friends. Let's look at the facts. How much credit card debt do you have? What's your income? Let's do the math and actually look at actual numbers to find out what's possible. Let's start putting some facts around the situation versus just letting it float around up in your head and go, There's no way out. I'm scared.

Okay, next one. I keep getting raises, but my lifestyle just continues to grow with it, and I can't seem to stop.

This is not in the book, but I think I'm going to go with some pride. The reason I say that is because it's like what we talked about before with the quiet luxury. If you're getting raises and your lifestyle continues to creep up, you have to ask why. Is it a presentation that you're trying to put out there and show a facade to the world? Or is it a bunch of quiet luxury things that no one would ever know about. I bet it's not. I bet you're driving an Escalade. I bet you're driving a Porsche. I bet your clothes are extremely expensive and people can tell. I bet you're taking crazy trips and posting them on social media. That's what I I think, and I tell folks all the time that when you're sacrificing for a short period or maybe a long period to win with money, it shows. It's okay for people to notice that you're making changes with your money. Maybe you're not spending as much. Maybe you don't go to all the brunches. Maybe you're not doing the things that your circle is doing. That's okay. That's a hit to our pride.

A lot of people aren't willing to go on that ride in order to win.

I feel like a lot of entrepreneurs act that way as because we're high achievers and we want to just keep achieving and want our lifestyle to go along with that. I know money doesn't only impact ourselves. It really impacts our relationships, especially marriages and things like that. What do you think are the common challenges people have around money when it comes to being married and sharing finances with somebody else?

The two biggest things is we have different goals in a moment and trust. Let's start with that because I'm a person who's I'm always going to suggest if you're married, I think the best way to manage finances is to pair them up and to say, Okay, what's yours is mine, what's mine is yours. But the second part of that is there has to be a high level of trust to be able to do that. We have to have a shared vision on where we're trying to go together. One spouse can't be dead weight. Otherwise, it's like, Well, hello, what's going on here? That right there, for some couples, it's very easy. It's almost intuitive. I'll be honest, when my husband and I got together, it was intuitive for us. I don't know if we were just young and dumb and just didn't have anything to think about, but it was very easy. Same bank account, money goes in. What's our goal? We're aligned. Let's go do it. It was easy. But that is not the case for a lot of couples. Let's be honest, all couples are not healthy. What that does is it does expose a level of unhealthiness, and a lot of times you won't even see it until you have those conversations.

One spouse comes the other and says, Okay, I'm thinking we ought to combine. I want total transparency. I want to know what you make. You should know what I make. I want to know your debt. I want to know what you're spending on, vice versa. That creates a lot of uncomfortable. You have to ask yourself, Well, why are you so uncomfortable? Why is it that we're hiding things? I find a lot of times that leads to, You know what? I think that we have trust issues, or I think that it's time for us to go into counseling and figure out what's at the root of this. None of that's bad. That's actually a very good thing because money is so relational. Money is so a part of everything that we do. I tell people that all the time. It touches every part of our life. It touches our relationships. It touches our spirituality. It touches our emotions. It touches our career. It touches our hobbies. It's part of everything that we do. It makes sense that there would be levels that are exposed over time that go, Oh, that doesn't feel quite right. Maybe I need to look at that deeper.

Of course, with relationships, it's no different.

I imagine that the older you are before getting into a serious relationship, the worse the problems are because there's more at stake. Everybody's coming with more baggage, right?

Yeah, and you're set in your ways. The truth is, you've done a lot. If I'm talking to somebody who's 23, no problem. They're 23, they're getting married for the first time. They're excited to combine finances. If I talk to somebody who's 43 getting married for the first time, it's It's a whole set of differences. They've built a career, they've hopefully built a level of wealth, they've built a lifestyle that they enjoy, and they've done it likely on their own. The idea of pairing up with someone who might have a slightly different philosophy on money and spending and debt and entrepreneurship, those conversations, I cannot stress this enough, they have to happen early and often. You cannot save that for after you get married. Then there's the idea of what if you've been married before or what if there are prior children and you've built wealth? These are things that you've got to talk about ahead of time. You got to bring in a third party to help counsel through it. Because if you think that you're just going to get married to someone because you like them and you love them, You've never talked about money, and money is not going to come up, you're dead wrong.

What's up, young and profiters. I remember when I first started YAP, I used to dread missing important calls. I remember I lost a huge potential partnership because the follow-up thread got completely lost in my messy communication system. Well, this year, I'm focused on not missing any opportunities, and that starts with your business communications. A missed call is money and growth out the door. That's why today's episode is brought to you by Quo, spelled Q-U-O, the smarter way to run your business communications. Quo is the number one rated business phone system on G2, and it works right from an app on your phone or computer. The way Quo works is magic for team alignment. Your whole team can handle calls and text from one shared number, and everyone sees the full conversation. It's like having access to a shared email inbox but on a phone. Also, Quo's AI can even qualify leads or respond after hours, ensuring your business stays responsive even when you finally logged off. It makes doing business so much easier. Make this the year where no opportunity and no customer slips away. Try Quo for free, plus get 20% off your first six months when you go to quo.

Com/profiting. That's Quo. Com/profiting. Quo. No missed calls, no missed customers. Hello, YAP gang. I know my young and profiting listeners want bigger businesses and a better life, and the new year is the perfect moment to reset and commit to your growth. But let's be real, you can't build an empire if your finances are all over the place. That's why getting into it, Quickbooks, is one of the best first moves you can make this year. They've got powerful money management tools built right into their platform, and they have them for every stage of your business, whether you're a solopreneur or a small business. I love that Quickbooks helps you get paid faster, pay bills smarter, and even gives you access to funding when opportunity pops up. So Quickbooks can help you with bookkeeping, can help you with getting paid, can even help you with projections and understanding where your business is at financially. Plus, QuickBooks Money Solutions reduces manual work by half and keeps your money and your books perfectly synced. That means less time staring at spreadsheets and more time actually building the vision that you started with. That's the upgrade that every profiting an entrepreneur needs.

Start the new year strong, take control of your cash flow with Quickbooks Money tools. Learn more at quickbooks. Com/money. Again, that's quickbooks. Com/money. Terms apply. Money Movement services are provided by Intuit Payments Incorporated, licensed as a money transmitter by the New York State Department of Financial Services. What's up, Yap, gang? If you're a serious entrepreneur like me, you know your website is one of the first touchpoints every single cold customer has with your brand. Think about that for a second. When people are searching on Google, everybody who interacts with your brand first is seeing your. Com initially. But here's the problem. Too many companies treat their website like a formality instead of the gross tool that it should be. At Yap Media, we are guilty of this. I am really do for an upgrade from my website, and I'm planning on doing that with Framer this year because small changes can take days with my other platform, and simple updates require tickets. And suddenly, we're just leaving so much opportunity on the table. And that's why so many teams, including mine, turning to Framer. It's built for teams who refuse to let their website slow them down.

Your designers and marketers get full ownership with real-time collaboration, everything you need for SEO and analytics with integrated A/B testing. I love that. I love testing and making sure that we've got the best performing assets on the page. You make a change, hit publish, and it's live in seconds. Whether you're launching a new site, testing landing pages, or migrating your full. Com, Framer makes going from idea to live site fast and simple. Learn how you can get more out of your. Com from a Framer specialist or get started building for free today at framer. Com/profiting for 30% off a Framer Pro annual plan. That's 30% off in 2026. Again, that's framer. Com/profiting for 30% off off framer. Com/profiting. Rules and restrictions apply. Okay, so let's go through a real-life scenario. Let's go through my current relationship. I have a boyfriend. We're very serious. We're hopefully going to get married one day. We very different attitudes towards money. I am a little bit older than him, and I make a lot of money. I'm making close to a million dollars personally a year. That just goes straight to me. I have a company that makes about $8 million a year, and I spend a lot.

I'll buy bags, I'll buy shoes, I'll drop a couple of $1,000 just shopping. For him, he's an entrepreneur, too. He's doing well, but he's in an earlier stage, and so he's not taking that much money out of the business. We're in totally different I think he's going to be richer than me one day. But right now-Not yet. Not yet. I've got a lot more spending cash. Sometimes he's like, What? You spend what on what? We're just really different in that regard. What should we be doing to prevent anything from going south later on?

There's a couple of thoughts I have. First thing that comes to mind is when you're married, there is a level of acceptance of the things that one spouse finds value in, the other spouse might not. That's okay just knowing that ahead of time. For instance, my husband, he loves sneakers. I love sneakers too, but he loves them on a different level. He will drop thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars on sneakers. I won't. Now, there was a world, we've been married 16 years now. There was a time where I would have taken him to task on that and been like, I can't believe you're spending money on that. We can't afford that. But now I go, Hey, I have figured out. I've become a professional detective of my spouse, and I've understood, Hey, he doesn't spend money a whole lot on everyday things, but there's a few things that he really loves. If he's going to spend money, it's going to be a list of five things, and sneakers is one of them. Go ahead and let him have it. It's the same thing, I would say, for you guys. You're going to learn, Hey, this is something they value, and I may not value it, but if I value them, I can learn to value what they value.

It's just a maturity there. Now, don't get me wrong, you're in a different Obviously, you have the money to spend. So it's no question of, Can you afford it or not? And so for you, I'd be like, Yeah, he just needs to learn, Hey, Holland might spend money on things that I don't care about, but so does he. I'm sure he has a list of things that you're like, Why would you ever buy that?

Yeah. First class tickets. That's my girl math. I'm going to 23C in my Prada shoes.

Exactly. And it doesn't have to make sense to anybody else, but if it makes sense to you guys, then there you go. And the other thing is, Let's get controvers here. People call in the show all the time and talk about prenups. I used to be like, no, pretty much hard line on a prenup. But more and more, I'm like, you know what? Depending on the differences in wealth, listen, It might be a good idea. Let's talk about this for a second. My colleague is getting ready to write a book on marriage and whether marriage is still worth it or not. In some of the research that he was doing, he was talking about how prenups in many ways are like a will. If you know you're going to die, you don't want your assets to be in the hands of the courts. It's like, let me decide ahead of time so the courts don't decide. A prenup is the same way. Do you really want the courts to decide what happens if the worst should happen. Now, death is a little bit different. We're all going to die. But the idea of the courts deciding is what got me.

I was starting to think. I'm not saying this is not Jade Warshaw's stance, but it's something to think about. What if there was a world where people, ahead of time, decided while they're in their right mind, they're not angry, they're not trying to stick it to anybody, and you decided, Hey, if something should happen, what would we do? So you create this prenup ahead of time. There's something to be said about that. That is all I'm saying.

It's something to think about. I don't know if I would or not. Don't you feel like having a prenup, I just feel it gives too much... I would rather probably not have one.

It's like bad juju.

Yeah, it's bad juju because then you just know it's so It's easy to just move on.

Listen, I said everything I just said. I will also tell you if my husband came to me talking about sign a prenup, it'd be lights out.

You're like, I'm not going to do it.

I'm not doing it.

Yeah. What are some communication strategies for people who are married? Should they talk monthly, weekly, yearly? How often should they be talking about these things? Do you give any advice in the book in terms of actionable steps?

It depends on what's going on. If things feel pretty healthy and everything is Are we going on the right track? Yeah. A monthly budget meeting or a monthly meeting to discuss goals, are we still on the right track? I love that idea as far as a rhythm of just getting in sync. My husband, every month, it's like, Hey, I Filled in the numbers on the budget, do we still feel good about it? Yeah. Is anything coming up that we should be thinking about or planning for? He's usually the person that handles that. Hey, we have a trip coming up. Here's what we need to be thinking about. Fine. Then we do a big couple hour long meeting at at the end of the year to project our coming year and say, Here's the big goals that we're thinking, and just dream a little bit. That's the healthy scenario. If you're in an unhealthy scenario, yeah, you need to be in counseling and you need to be bringing this stuff up early and often, like I said, the best time to talk about this is before you're married. You should be doing this in some pre-marriage counseling, and you should be having this conversation with a third party because all of us think that our way is the right way, and it's hard to pull our fingers off of what it is that we want.

So you need a third party to help you see clearly and to help you get to a point of compromise. It's not all or nothing. That's the thing. You have to be willing to compromise because the way you've always done it doesn't necessarily mean that that's the way it's going to be going forward.

When it comes to entrepreneurs, what do you think their biggest money struggles are?

We're know-it-alls. We know everything. We want to go fast. I can say that I mean, my husband and I built a talent agency. That's the business my husband runs to this day. You have opportunity in front of you every single day, and you want to go get it. One of the biggest temptations is going into more and more debt to try to pull that dream closer and closer to you. That's a big struggle. It's just the idea of, I know it all. I know it. I can do it. I'm smart. After all, I built all of this. We get to this, it's like the paper wings flying too close to the sun. I think that's the hardest part for people who are entrepreneurs who want to go fast. Again, it does go back to that pride, that know it all, that I deserve this. We have to be careful. We have to check ourselves before we wreck ourselves and make sure that we have very, very trustworthy accountability partners in our corner. I talk about that. The people in your corner, they need to be able to do two things really well. They need to be able to encourage you say, Yeah, you can do it.

You got it. You got it. They also need to be there to be like, Hey, you're about to play yourself, and you need to stop, and you need to sit down. The most dangerous thing is when you don't have anybody in your corner who can check you. If you don't, you need it because that's the recipe. Pride goes before the fall. If you're a person who everybody is telling you, You got this, man, man, you're so smart, you're so great, you're so good. Look at this. That's a problem. If no one, I I don't care who you are. You could be Elon Musk. If you don't have somebody who's saying, You're wrong and you need to stop, get ready to fall.

I know something that I struggle with is I feel like budgeting is maybe for people who don't make a lot of money. Instead of budgeting, I always think, Well, how do I just make more money? How do I just make more money? That's always where my focus is. I just want to make more money, more money, more money. What are some new ideas I can do? How can I just make more money so that I never have to worry about budgeting and I can just buy whatever I want and not think about it? Is that wrong?

No, I don't think it's wrong. I do think that the older, the more mature you get in your money, I think the way you budget and the way it looks, looks a little different. Let's think about it on a scale. If you're just the average person, you're making $68,000 to $70,000 a year, $68,000 to $78,000 a year. Yeah, your budget is going to be extremely detailed because every dollar is really does count. You don't have the margin to make a bunch of errors. Whatever margin you do have has to have a very clear job in order to move you forward. There is no margin for error. Then you get a little bit further on in the game and maybe you're making mid six figures. If you don't have a ton of debt, you have a lot more margin. Therefore, again, your margin of error becomes a lot higher. Because if you have several thousand dollars to blow every month, especially if you don't have debt Especially if you don't have all these other obligations, yeah, you can afford. As long as you're doing the things that are on my financially responsible checklist, you do. You have the margin to be a little bit more willy-nilly.

You go on a vacation and it costs 7,000 dollars instead of $5,000, you can eat that, right? Or it costs $12,000 instead of $10,000. You eat that cost. Then, of course, as you go up and you're making seven figures and you're really doing it, yes, I believe it becomes more of the of things I'd like to do because everything else is basically taken care of. Now, if you're a financially responsible person, now, of course, we see every day athletes, people who win the lottery, people who go from zero to millions very, very quickly if they never learned how to manage their money, that's a problem because they're not understanding, I must do all of this over here in this block. I must do all of this over here in this block, and then this block is for me to enjoy. If you don't understand the basic concept that the three things you do with money, you give, you save, and you spend, you're sunk. I do think that the more you earn, it becomes those big bubbles versus the perfect line item budget.

That makes a lot of sense. That's how I think of it as big buckets or a big goal that I'm trying to save for. But other than that, everything's more loose, I guess. You mentioned this financially responsible checklist. You've got to run that down for us.

So financially responsible checklist. Number one, you're a person who is living on some budget, like we talked about. That is just I know my numbers, essentially. I know what I earn, and I know what my expenses are, and I know what piece of margin is going for this and what piece of margin is going for that. I'm living my life on a budget. Number two, I'm a proponent of a debt-free lifestyle. I'm a person who's out of debt. I avoid debt at all costs. So, so important. Number three, I'm a person who carries the proper insurances. All right? So many people don't, whether it's in the business world or it's in their personal life. I see it all the time. I talk to normal everyday people about their normal personal finances, and people are overinsured or underinsured or not insured, and it's a problem. They don't pick up life insurance because they think it's an inconvenience. I'm like, It's absolutely not. You need life insurance. Carrying the proper insurance, the fourth one on the list, of course, is a person who values savings. That comes in a couple of different forms. Of course, you need to be having a cash emergency fund.

I would say anywhere between 3-6 months. Some people do a year. That's your bag if you want to do that. But this is just cash money you get to. You need to be investing at least 15% of your income, if that's the point in your life that you're at, if you're at an investing point, at least 15% of your income at the very minimum. Then, of course, yeah, real estate. You need to have a primary residence. Renting for a season is fine, but long term, you need to own something. It's like a forced savings account. If you're buying good, real estate is going up in value all the time. Those are the three ways that I would suggest saving money for anybody. Then, finally, you need to be number five would be, you need to be prioritizing generosity. People forget about that one. Generosity is so important. I said it earlier, of the three things you do, give, save, and spend, giving is at the top of the list. We've all heard the parable, when your hand is open, money comes in and money comes out.

For entrepreneurs tuning in, something that really piqued my interest was you mentioned insurance, even for your business or as a business owner. What insurance should entrepreneurs consider?

It really depends on what you do. I mean, you've got to have some liability insurance built in. If you're a person who has a high networth, you need to have some umbrella insurance that is covering you as an individual, whether your business is set up in an LLC to keep you protected. All of those things matter. Making sure that your business is set up, your insurance structure is set up. If you're doing something where you could injure someone or you could piss somebody off, making sure that they're not coming after you as an individual, but that the business is protecting you. So all of that is so, so important. A lot of people just get excited about getting clients and making money that they're not set up properly. Another indicator of that is, I hate to say it, but people call in all the time and they're not even paying their taxes. Making sure that you're set up with the right insurances, the right business entity for what it is that you do and that you're paying your taxes, people, please. You don't want to mess with Uncle Sam. That's ridiculousness.

Yeah. Taxes suck, but...

They do, but they're an indicator that you're making money, and that's a good thing. Yeah. Cool.

So, Kate, I know that you have two children. What's a money belief that you absolutely don't want them to inherit?

Oh, boy. In their young age right now, because they're five and seven, the first thing I'm teaching them is that just because they walk into a place, whether it's a store or a theme park, they don't have to buy anything. A lot of times it's like everywhere we go, they want to buy something or they want to have more and more things. I don't know if it's just the age that they're at or if it's truly the level of they've just had a great life. I don't know if it's just that.

They're used to it.

Yeah, I'm used to it. I should get to have something. It's no big deal. But I really want to teach them that stuff doesn't equal happiness. Just because you go to Target, you don't have to buy anything. You can go into a coffee shop to meet a friend and say hello, and you don't have to order anything off the menu. You can just sit down if you're not hungry. I just want to teach them that you don't have to buy something. You can just exist and be and be happy. Stuff does not equal happiness. It doesn't equal contentment. I want to teach them that because it is absolutely true. I'm going into a deeper thing here, but when When you're in a situation where you can see the value of life, whether it's a sick family member, none of that stuff matters anymore. Your money at that point doesn't matter. My mom right now is fighting cancer, and You get to a point where it doesn't matter. There's no more money. Money can't do anything for me. What I can do, though, is create memories. What I can, though, do is sit with them. I can take care of them.

I can reminisce with them. But Buying something means nothing in those situations. If I can make them understand that, I'm winning as a parent.

Why don't we go a little bit deeper on that? I think a big issue that people have with money is that they never know when it's enough. I feel like a lot of people prioritize making money, especially high achievers, entrepreneurs, over living actual experiences, or their whole life is basically fighting this opportunity to just make as much money as possible instead actually living life. How can we better optimize our lives and not let money control us so much?

You hit the nail on the head. My husband explains it as a goalpost, the end zone in the goalpost is always moving. You get closer and you're like, If I just do this, that's the breakdown. Then you do it, and then you move your own end zone and go, Okay, now I got to make another breakdown. It never stops. I think that's the danger of money is it keeps pulling you in and pulling you in and I'm calling you it in. You have to decide, what is the point that I am content if I don't make another dollar? Then everything after that is just gravy. I think that's important. I think generosity is an important combat to that. Then the other thing is, I do think that it depends on the season of life you're in. I can say that when I didn't have kids, I would work, work, work, work, work working alongside me, why not? But then it's like you get a dog and you're like, Well, I want to spend more. I don't want my dog sitting at home all day without me home. Then you have kids and you're like, Well, I want to see my kids.

You have to just remember that the number one thing you can't replace is time with time and presence. I feel that now as a mom, I go to work or I go and travel for work and things like that. I'm like, Man, these are moments and seconds and hours and days that I won't get back with my kids. That is the thing. I think we've all seen these reels or these memes that go by. It's like, yeah, at the end of your life, people aren't saying, Man, my mom, she really impacted thousands of people and she really made a lot of money. They're going to go, I remember when we went to Disney and I was scared to go on the roller coaster, and she went on the roller coaster with me. They remember those moments, and that's what we're going to remember. We as the worker, we're not going to sit on our deathbed and go, Man, if only I had just closed that deal. We might say, I wish I had taken that leap of faith on that business, or I wish I had gone after that. That could be a regret. But more so, we're not going to want our business partner at our bedside.

We're not going to want the CEO of the company we're trying to land a deal with at our bedside. We're going to want our family members there. We better make sure we pour it into those relationships so that they'll be there. Because I also know what it looks like when somebody hasn't poured into those relationships It's like, Hey, it's not a magic genie. People aren't just going to be there because you want them to be. If you neglected them, if you weren't around them, if you didn't show any interest in what they were doing, good luck to you because they're not going to be there when you need them because there was never a relationship. That's not going to come out of thin air, so you better invest in them now.

So good. I know one of the questions that I ask all my guests at the end of the show is, what is your secret to profiting to life? Almost everybody always says relationships. That's the number one thing that drives your finances and also just your regular life and having a happy life. Jade, what does financial peace look like for you?

Financial peace is all-encompassing peace. It really is. It's like I said before, money touches every area of our life. A lot of times we think money is just this thing that's in our wallet and that's it, and it buys us things when we want it. But it's not. It's deeply connected to how we view ourselves, like I said, our relationships, our spirituality, all of those things. When you achieve financial peace, it's just this ability, and you hit on it earlier, to just go about life with ease. It's the... The feeling of, You know what? The check was supposed to come Monday, and it didn't. Okay, we'll figure it out. There's no stress. There is the ease of if somebody in your family needs something, You can help them, and you don't have to set yourself on fire to help somebody else. You can just help them. Financial peace is an ease of life. It is peace all around. It's the ability to make sure that you're not so focused on money and making things right with that, that you're neglecting these other areas of your life. You're neglecting your own mental health. You're neglecting your relationships.

You're neglecting... You're not in the career path that you want to be on. When you get your money right, everything Everything else begins to fall into place.

What is one thing our listeners should do at the start of 2026 to set them up financially for the year?

I would say one thing that you need to do is set up a five-year plan for yourself and make it so clear, where do you see yourself in five years, and put a very, very, very crystal clear Y attached to that. The why will serve as that finish line that we talked about earlier, because if the goal is just to get it, then there's no finish line. But if there's a Y so that I can achieve X so that my family is set up for life so that my kids know it's possible, whatever that Y is, that's got to be the exclamation point at the end of the sentence.

So your new book is out now, What No One Tells You About Money. Why should everybody go pick up your book?

They need to pick it up because everybody's trying to get ahead with money, and money is emotional. It's three parts. There is the numbers and the math, there's the behavior, and then there's you and your emotions. That's how it works. And most of us have these emotions running unchecked in the background. This book is going to help you diagnose what it is that's keeping you stuck, and it's going to give you the antidote to get unstuck and to help those emotions work for you.

Well, if you guys want to be young and profiting, you better go grab Jade's book. The last question I ask all of my guests is, what is your secret to profiting in life?

My secret to profiting in life is knowing that time is going to pass anyway. You've got three options. You can stay the same, you can be worse off, or you can be better. I choose to be better.

I love that. Thank you so much, Jade, for your time. It was a wonderful conversation.

Thanks, Hala.

What a great kickstart to the year with Jade Warshaw. She didn't just give us budgeting tips. She exposed the emotional undercurrents that sabotage our financial lives and showed us exactly how We can take control back in 2026. Here's what hit home for me in this conversation. It was Jade's truth bomb. It may not have been your fault, but it's your job to fix it. Your money problems are your job to fix. Whether inflation crushed your savings, student loans buried you, or life through an unexpected curveball, nobody's coming to rescue you. You can't blame your way to a better financial future. The only person who can change your situation is staring right back at you in the mirror. So stop Stop waiting for somebody else to solve your money problems and start taking responsibility and accountability for it today. Second, pay attention to your financial check engine lights. If you're logging into your bank account before you're ordering brunch or switching from a bit to credit mid-month or avoiding your balance altogether and not even looking at your bank accounts, those are red flags that are screaming that something is wrong. These are warning signs that you just can't ignore and they won't disappear on their own.

You've got to address them now before they turn into a full-blown financial blowup later on. Third, if you're making good money but you still feel broke every month, your budget is not working. Jade reminded us that an effective budget must be detailed, realistic, and flexible. You need to know exactly where every dollar is going, set realistic expectations for your spending, and build room for life to happen as well. Without all three elements, you'll stay stuck in frustration, spinning your wheels without any real progress. Remember, money isn't math. It's emotional, relational, and deeply tied to your identity. The faster you diagnose what's actually keeping you stuck and take action to fix it, the sooner you get to experience true financial peace. Thanks so much for tuning in to this New Year kickoff episode of Young and Profiting podcast. Jade's Insights offer the perfect reset for anybody ready for a financial glowup in 2026. So if you know somebody who's looking for that, make sure you pass this episode along. And if you benefited from this show, lock in your support right now by taking a minute to drop us a five-star review on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcast.

And if you guys are visual learners, all of our episodes are on YouTube. Just search Young and Profiting. You can't miss us on there. And if you want to follow me on social, you can find me on Instagram at Yappithhalla or LinkedIn, just search for my name, it's Halla Taha. And before we wrap, I did want to wish everybody the happiest new year. 2026 is going to be so exciting for Yapp Media, so shout out to my entire team for all your hard work and for all that's to come this year. And to my listeners, our audience, we love you guys so much. Let's make this the best year yet. This is your host, Halla Taha, AKA the podcast Princess, signing off.