Thoughts: On Work

Earlier this week, I came home from working a day of dentistry. It was Monday, which is a day I am usually off. I was covering for a friend who went on vacation to Korea for a month. I pulled into my driveway as my neighbor was putting away the groceries. She saw me wearing my Figs scrubs (the only brand I wear for work) and cocked her head to the side. “What else do you do besides taking care of dogs?” A funny question, as the dog business is my side-hustle. But here in my neighborhood, I’m known as a dog caretaker, not a dentist. So I told her I work as a dentist and she appeared even more confused. “But if you’re a dentist, why do you bother taking care of pets?” she asked.

Now it was my turn to get a quizzical look on my face. This happens a lot in my life. A sort of disconnect between myself and others who follow the formulaic status quo. I could tell right away that she didn’t understand the point of working if it wasn’t for pay. It was also obvious that she viewed work as a job that one must do, whereas I viewed work as fun things I like to do. She is a stay-at-home mom and might be proud of the fact that she didn’t have to work. It’s also possible she was insinuating the question, “Do you not make enough as a dentist that you have to do more side-hustles?”

So I answered her as truthfully as I can.

“I take care of pets because I like to. It’s fun for me, and I fall in love with them and treat them like my kids. I started out watching just one or two here and there, but now I get requests all the time. Since I have a lot of time on my hands, I accommodate as many as I can. This way, our neighbors can go on their vacations with peaceful minds, knowing who is taking care of their pet family members.

I actually do a lot of things! They are all fun for me and give me joy. On top of taking care of pets, I am helping a bakery grow and I write a blog to help new grads, moms, and people in debt live minimalist lives in order to get closer to financial freedom. I also volunteer at the farm down the street. You should join me sometime!”

Her son came out of the house at that point. A saving grace for both of us. ‘Ah, okay’ as she backed away. I hope I didn’t freak her out. But it’s true. I can’t say at what point during the pandemic I actually became financially free – in the sense that I am not tied to my money, and I stopped working for pay alone.

Perhaps it was when I had enough FU money to quit the job that I hated. More likely it was the healing time period when I learned that I could create any position for myself. Or maybe it was after people reached out to me to help them. Did you know that I never asked to work at either of the two dental offices I currently work at? Actually, I was expecting to never work in dentistry again! I also did not apply to be a wholesale director of the bakery. In all three cases, they came to me and asked if I could help at times when they had no one.

I do my work because it entails helping others. That’s what I like to do. Not because of the money anymore. If my jobs were taken away from me today, I wouldn’t be sad, mad, upset, or worried. I would probably just shrug my shoulders and keep contributing myself to this life, keep showing up for people I’ve gotten to know. Not much would change, except maybe a pivotal shift on where I spend my energy most.

When I think about work, I don’t think of it in the traditional sense of a job. I just think of it as another day where I go and help a few people out. That’s all. I am not dependent on a specific company or career. I am only dependent on myself. I’ve focused on building myself up rather than building a career. (That’s advice I would give any college student!)

My neighbor was probably thinking to herself, “Poor gal. She has to work so hard to be able to live.” I’m over here thinking, “How do I get this neighbor out of her box to join me in this thing called life?” Hopefully we become fast friends. Bringing over banana bread might do it.

Do what you love, and call it work. Some say it can’t be done, but I’m trying my darndest to prove them wrong.

Afterthoughts on: “10 Steps for Financial Success for New Grads”

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

This past week, I had the pleasure of hopping on an InstaLive session with Dr. Unorthodoc once again. In this week’s Live, we talked about my recent post: 10 Steps for Financial Success for New Grads. She even threw in two bonus recommendations, which you can surely review on her Instagram @dr.unorthodoc. In typical fashion, I’ve spent the last few days conjuring up a few afterthoughts that I wanted to share in this post.

Regarding Financial Success:

“Financial success” can mean different things to different people. The vision could include accumulated wealth, fancy things, or financial freedom. For me, it is certainly the latter. A quote that I recently read sums up my idea of success:

“A nice car and a big house are the old status symbols. The ultimate flex is freedom. Time freedom, location freedom, and financial freedom.”

Obviously what was success to my parents’ generation is not financial success to me. The same goes for a peer of mine who might hold different values, be in a different situation, or have a different upbringing. There is no judgement in that fact. It is simply an observation. When I talk about my own journey, I don’t want to exclude people and make them feel like the information is irrelevant to them. I want them to tailor my experiences to their own needs and versions of financial success. Because of this, not every tactic we discuss will apply to everyone and certainly the order in which you do things may change. We went into some of those details in the InstaLive so feel free to check it out!

Regarding Where to Spend Your First Paycheck:

Some of my classmates spent their first paycheck investing in the stock market or contributing to their 401k’s. Some saved up for their first home’s down-payment or upgraded their cars. I used my first paycheck to pay for a financial planner. (The two recommendations we mentioned in the podcast were Travis Hornsby from Student Loan Planner and Andrew Paulson from White Coat Investor.)

This is a prime example of how we can use our money to get closer to our ideas of financial success (wealth, stuff, and freedom). For me, I wanted to be free from debt or anything that would prevent me from living as I please in a day-to-day basis.

Regarding Financial Literacy:

What this also shows is differing levels of financial literacy. I think that’s what makes my financial journey so relatable is the fact that I started at the bottom with zero financial literacy. Meaning, I have been through every possible stage of wealth accumulation so many people can relate to the different phases of my financial journey.

I have classmates who have more money awareness than I did at graduation. Heck, I had friends who had more money period! One of my closest friends spent his mornings in dental school investing in the stock market. I was not even exposed to that world at that point in my life. I also did not have access to generational wealth being a zero generation immigrant.

I am not saying this in an accusatory way or anything like that. But, certainly, they were better versed and can invest in things right out of school because they were at a stage in their life where they were already set up for that. Just because I started at the bottom doesn’t mean every has to hire a financial planner. You might already know everything a financial planner has to tell you!

Remember: the path to financial success is mutli-factorial. The level of financial literacy, current phase of wealth accumulation and your personal definition of financial success all play a role towards your path post grad.

Regarding Student Loans

The best advice that I can give is to choose a path that works for you.

Not everyone should aggressively pay student loans back, and I don’t mind going on record saying that! Those whose definition of financial success falls under wealth accumulation or having nice things would be better off with the loan forgiveness program, granted that they invest their money in preparation for the tax bomb at the end of the 20-25 years. Those who yearn for freedom or value frugal living would benefit from paying it off aggressively.

The question new grads need to answer is, “What lifestyle do I want to live?”

Since my values are centered around gaining financial freedom, the reasons why I decided to pay my student loans off aggressively are as follows:

I don’t like having debt looming over my shoulder. It causes me stress and holding on to debt has a psychological and emotional toll on me. Even when it comes to a to-do list, I am the type of person that prefers to check off tasks as quickly as possible, in order to alleviate worry. If you asked my husband, my famous saying that would follow me to the grave would be, “Let’s get it over with!”. Regardless of whether the task at hand is enjoyable or not, the part that matters more to me is getting it done. At the end of the day, it gives me more peace to get rid of my debt.
I am not the type of person to only do one thing for the rest of my life. Right after graduation, I knew that I wasn’t going to be the type of dentist who would happily work a 9-5 shift Monday through Friday, running a practice until I was 65 years old. I am a creative person and I wanted to have the choice to quit dentistry all together, whenever I want. If anything, the last four years since graduating has been proof that the 25 year loan forgiveness is not for me. I’ve already quit once (here I wrote about How to Gain Enough Financial Independence to Quit Your Job) which happened to be a job that did not bring me joy at a time when I wanted to recreate myself (we can blame that on Saturn’s return.) I’m the type of person who wants to be a baker some days, a writer other days, a pet caregiver on my time off, and a world traveler not tied down by a consistent job. I want to work remotely in my pajamas at home sometimes, and interact with people other times. I want to think up of ideas as much as work with my hands. Because this is the person I am, I decided having no debt gave me more freedom to live wherever, work however, and be whomever. This required a deep understanding of the true me, which is where the real work lies.
Lastly, I am a numbers gal and while there is wealth growth potential to doing the loan forgiveness programs, it appealed to me that paying the loans off in ten years time is still cheaper than waiting 20-odd years – cheaper by more than $100,000! Of course that profit margin increases even more if you pay it back quicker than 10 years, which is what I am trying to do!

Regarding Emergency Funds:

I like emergency funds because it gives me that layer of added security and ease of mind. That being said, emergency funds don’t have to be that traditional idea of putting away a monetary amount in a savings account or in a safe under your home. I don’t like that idea anyway because that prevents you from growing your wealth. You should at least invest it as a hedge against inflation. I like to make every single dollar work for me and I love the idea of passive income. There are many ways to have an emergency fund without reducing the chances of wealth accumulation.

Open a brokerage account and invest your savings into something. Even a mutual index fund like SPY, VTI, or VTSX will be better than keeping it in a savings account, especially if you don’t know much about stocks. Your brokerage account can be you investing in stocks, but also a source of funds in cases of true emergency.
We travel hack a lot so that we never have to spend our hard-earned dollars on our travels. Which means we have multiple credit cards open at the same time that have maximum limits. Since we pay all our credit cards in full every month, we have those funds readily available for emergencies. Between my husband and I, we have over $100k in unused credit card spending (I alone have $83k) and that is a source that we can turn to in case of a true emergency.
Depending on your loan situation, you could use pivoting your plans to gain access to more money during tough times. For example, even though I am paying off my loans aggressively, I remained with REPAYE the first three year’s to benefit from the program’s promise to pay half of the interest fees. My minimum monthly payment was $900 per month, but I was paying $6,500 or more per month. When 2020 hit and my husband lost his job for 10 months, we paid only the minimum payments to my loans and used the left-over to cover his income loss. Luckily, the interest rate since the pandemic has been at a miraculous 0%. Regardless, this was a good example of using loan repayment pivoting in cases of emergency.
Just like you can gain access to money by selling stocks, you can do the same if you have equity in real estate. We own a commercial/residential property and can sell it if things go south, immediately gaining access to our equity.

Regarding Investments:

We briefly touched on investments here but I think the InstaLive had better content within the banter that Dr.Unorthodoc and I had. I just want to summarize with the following: Investments are GREAT but require a bit of heeding. Do your research, don’t let emotions carry you away, and use your head.

Regarding the big picture:

I am all about balance – as you can tell from my lifestyle. Paying loans off aggressively does not hinder us from

-maxing out our 401K

-buying a property

-growing our wealth and investing in stocks

-building businesses

Do a bit of everything! It makes life more fun and interesting. I view life as one big social experiment. Novelty is good for the soul and honestly, I know very few people who can do the grind and truly call themselves happy.

I am choosing happy.

XOXO

Why You Should Always Cash Out Your Venmo Account

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

I recently became aware of the fact that people keep funds in their Venmo accounts. I was shocked. From a finance perspective, this is a terrible move, keeping your money locked away for someone else’s use. By keeping money in a Venmo account, you are funding Venmo’s ability to fund others. I’m sure Venmo is happy. But your future self won’t be when you realize why this is bad for your financial life. So I decided to write a post about why we should always cash out our Venmo accounts. But first, a bit about my philosophy around money.

Related Posts:

I like to think of money as our life energy. We spend time and physical energy doing our work, in exchange for money. Money then becomes a tool to buy what we need and want. Therefore, money is the middle man between our life energy and our possessions. Because money is a symbol of life energy, I treat it preciously.

You see, I don’t like to work for money. I would prefer my money working for me. That is the basic premise of being rich. The more we get our money to make money for us, the less we have to do the physical work, which then saves life energy and time, both of which increases our potential to make even MORE money.

What do I mean by making money work for you?

Well, let’s say you take your money and invest it in a brokerage account. You buy an investment at $100 and the company grows and does well. Your $100 is now $150. You just had your money work for you, earning you $50 without you having to work. Of course you will be taxed on your gains, reducing your earned income to let’s say $30. That isn’t much different than being taxed for the income you earn. In the end, that’s still $30 you didn’t have before, and you didn’t lift a finger to earn it.

Another example is real estate. Take our story. We scrapped together a down-payment to buy our primary home. We purchased a property whose monthly mortgage would cost the same as our monthly rent. Then we rented a portion of our home. The money we put into the home adds value to our assets in the form of equity earned, and the rental unit downstairs earns us an extra $623 a month. Prior to purchasing this home, we were paying someone else to keep a roof over our heads. By buying this property, we are making our money work for us, not us working for someone else’s benefit.

Even if you feel like investing in stocks or buying real estate is out of reach, you can still have your money work for you in more conservative ways. I wrote about investing in High Yield Savings Accounts for people who want access to their money in the near future or who are too uncomfortable with stocks and real estate.

Also, in my free course on Mastering a Budget, I wrote about the importance of assigning every dollar a job. Dollars are like responsibilities within a household or a workplace. If someone isn’t assigned a responsibility, the work doesn’t get done. Likewise, you need to make your money accountable for doing the work for you. If not, it’ll most likely float past your fingertips into another person’s hands as quickly as you earned it. Nothing gets done because money isn’t held accountable, and neither are you.

What does this have to do with Venmo?

Well, I personally never keep my money in my Venmo account. There is no benefit to it. It doesn’t make my transactions go through faster. It doesn’t make it more convenient for me to track the dollars I have. It doesn’t allow me to give every dollar a job. And it doesn’t grow my wealth.

I pull out every dollar from Venmo (at $0 charge using the Standard Trasfer to my bank account) the minute the notification goes through that I got paid. There are two pros to this.

This pulls every transaction amount separately and automatically logs each bank deposit from Venmo as its own transaction. This is important because we use YNAB (a platform for budgeting called You Need A Budget) to give all our dollars a job. Withdrawing every dollar when I receive a Venmo deposit simplifies the categorization step in YNAB (my affiliate link to get you started). The categorization step allows us to track how every dollar is made and every dollar is spent.
It also allows us to then take that money and increase our wealth, by putting it somewhere it can grow (like a HYSA or investment account) or paying for something to avoid debt.

Keeping money in Venmo is like keeping money locked away. It prevents financial wealth from growing as fast as it can. It also makes it more difficult to master a budget. I don’t know about you, but I cannot keep track of how much money is in my Venmo handle once two or three transactions go through. I simply forget! If you think of your dollars as little employees working for you, then you are essentially keeping your employees in a cage preventing them from accomplishing work!

One final note:

There is a circulating argument that it is more convenient to pay a friend when there is already money in a Venmo account. I just want to attest to the fact that it’s not any more difficult to make a payment through Venmo by pulling the money directly from a bank account. And if, by “convenient”, one means that they can justify spending money more easily when it’s already in an account meant for fun activities (dining out, birthday gifts, pizza, etc.), then that’s just them fooling themselves. But they would be right.

It’s easy to tell yourself, “I can dine out tonight and I’ll venmo my friend Bob for the meal. There’s still money in my Venmo account.”

That IS convenient! But you aren’t getting any richer.

Imagine the alternative. Your friend Sue pays you for last week’s dinner. You had offered to pay for the meal for your group of friends so that you can earn the credit card reward points in order to travel hack and fly internationally for free. You immediately transfer the money Sue gives you and place it in your HYSA (this is my affiliate link to set a HYSA up with Marcus. It gives my readers an additional 0.2% APY boost). When Bob asks if you want to grab dinner, you think about how you don’t have enough in your “Dining Out” envelope for dinner tonight. You ask if Bob would prefer to order pizza and save $10 a person or if he would be open to rescheduling to a future date when more people can join so that you can catch up with multiple friends at once and save on your “dining out” spending.

Sure, it isn’t glamorous. But it isn’t inconvenient either. It is simply … financially SMART.

After you’ve emptied your Venmo accounts, consider – Where else are you holding your money for the “just because”? And then go out there and pay yourself first. Make your money make money for you.

Your life energy will thank you.

The True Cause of a Spending Problem

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

Do you have a spending problem? Are you someone who just can’t make ends meet? Have you found that no matter how much you increase your income, you can’t break the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle? Do you find yourself shopping when you are stressed or tired or sad? Perhaps this post is for you.

It may not be what you want to hear, but the truth is this:

A spending problem is the result of not knowing who you want to be, or where you want your life to go.

Emotional spending occurs because a void needs filling. Unfortunately, more often than not, the spending itself fails at solving the problem. Rather, it extenuates it by creating a loop cycle that enlarges the void and brings us further from our true goals.

For example, have you ever tried to treat your stress by shopping online? At first, it felt good, but after a while, regret starts to sink in and your newfound purchase falls short of delivering lasting happiness, not to mention instantly decreases in value. Does it sound familiar to you? Because it sure does to me.

Not knowing who we want to be or what we want our life to look like makes it difficult to know what is worthy of our time and money. If we do not have a clear purpose, goal, or ambition, then it becomes easy to fall into the cycle of spending our resources on what people around us promote, rather than what we need. Because what we gain was never truly for us, it doesn’t fill the void at all, resulting in spending again, and again, and again.

If you want to treat a spending problem, my financial advice is to start with you. Define who you want to be and where you want your life to go. At least, that’s what we did and it worked for us. Because I used to be like you, too. I had $30,000 in credit card debt. I had more than half a million dollars in student loans. I went shopping every weekend in my early twenties and bought avocado toast while I was in dental school. I had a serious spending problem, until I realized who I was and what I wanted.

I am a simple person. I enjoy reading books and baking bread. I find joy in quiet time and yoga. My mind is healthiest when I am outdoors collecting rocks on a beach. I wanted a life of financial freedom. I wanted to be able to choose a job to my liking. I wanted the autonomy to work in a way that is aligned to my values. I want the freedom to call my own hours, to choose days of rest, to pursue other passions, and I understood that I couldn’t do that if I chose material stuff, trends, and status symbols. That’s how this all started.

I was lucky enough to find a financial advisor in my early years who delved deeply into what I wanted for my future. It was only then, when I saw the big picture, did I have the motivation to get rid of my spending problem. And if I am being honest, without a clear picture of where I wanted my life to be, I would just as likely have reverted back to my previous ways. It was the clarity that kept me going.

The true cause of a spending problem is not being intentionally clear enough about your life.

Here are good places to start:

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If you have trouble paying off your credit card debts, you can always try The Credit Pros. They will help identify the most damaging and most helpful credit items, as well as provide advice and educational tools.

How to Gain Enough Financial Independence To Quit Your Job

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

Yesterday, a dentist came to the dental practice to do a working interview. He would be the doctor to take my place at our busy practice. Upon meeting me, he asked why I was leaving. I told him the truth – that I wanted to take a break from dentistry and spend time living life.

He looked at me quizzically, as if confused by the language I spoke.

“But what are you going to do with your student loans?,” he asked incredulously.

So I explained to him our financial journey. I tried to tell him that we live a life of financial independence. We don’t make our life decisions based on money alone. Rather, we decide what to do based on a happiness meter.

“But how can you do that? Aren’t you worried about your debt?”

When I told him no, that we had planned ahead for a lifestyle such as this, he scoffed lightly and said, “Most people decide to do that after loans are done.”

I simply shrugged and said, “I guess.”

I didn’t really have the energy at the time to convince someone that it is possible to live life financially independent. I recognized someone not ready to open up to the possibility of an alternative life, free of societal expectations and a pre-formulated timeline.

Even though we still have student debt, we have created all the micro-steps to be paid ahead of our original plan, build wealth, and have the reserves needed to create flexibility in our lives. What I did not explain to him was that most people are on a 20-25 year forgiveness plan. Only a few tackle a ten year repayment plan. We were on track for six years, despite having one of the largest debts possible caused by higher education. We have not ignored retirement accounts and have secured a real estate property that is both commercially zoned AND a residential address. We built a savings account that can support a 14-month hiatus from work without curbing our spending or selling our house. (If we sell our house, neither of us need work for over three years and still support our current living expenses, although I hardly see us not working for a few months in reality because that’s just my personality…) We made certain life decisions, such as buying a home in a lower-income area, choosing not to have kids (sorry mom and dad!), living a frugal lifestyle, prioritizing our passions over money, and living a life of less waste in order to get to this place. Some of these decisions were harder than others. We were both born into families that could not financially help us and we have worked hard and diligently to be here.

If he hadn’t been so judgmental about my decision to quit, I probably would have told him how he could do it, too.

On here, I wanted to share with those who were interested exactly how to gain financial independence and quit your job, if you wanted. It isn’t for everyone, and the path might not look exactly the same. I suppose in the end, I can only speak for myself, my life, and what I have done.

I am not sharing this because I think this is the best way to live life. I am sharing this because in resigning from work, I had more people come out of their shell and tell me that they’ve always wanted the freedom to do the same, but feel trapped in the workplace. I am sharing this because I want people to have hope and empowerment. I genuinely want to help.

Here is my not-so-secret, not-rocket-science, not-traditional, not-socially-approved-nor-socially-accepted way of gaining enough financial independence amidst student-debt enslavement to quit a job that was not right for me.

1. Figure out what you want in life.

Decide on your main priorities. Identify your values and try to marry your lifestyle with those values. Only then can you curate your life in a way that brings you complete joy.

2. Eliminate all the unnecessaries.

For me, that meant unnecessary material things, as well as unnecesssary people. Even quitting my job was a practice of getting rid of the unnecessaries. It started with de-cluttering my life, then severing toxic relationships, then separating myself from obligation and societal expectations and norms. Now, I have the ability to assess whether things improve my life or not. If not, then I let go.

3. Begin to grow your wealth.

After steps one and two, all that is left are the bits of life that add value. It started with Mastering a Budget. I wrote an entire course on how to do it, and I shared it with the world for free. I have been told by my students that it has been helpful to their journey. Here are a few testimonials:

Prior to this course, I considered myself pretty familiar with my expenses and a mindful shopper. However, at the end of each month I constantly found myself wondering where all my income had gone. I realized that I was in denial about my budgeting skills & decided to purchase this course. “Mastering a Budget” challenged me to think hard about my goals and how my finances play a role in achieving such goals. Developing a clear understanding of my “why” for budgeting has kept me on track when I feel like I am going off course with my finances. While on this budgeting journey, I realized that I was spending more than expected on certain categories and not saving nearly enough towards my goals. Additionally, the frugal challenges detailed in the course put me outside of my comfort zone but had long last financial benefits that I will continue to carry on. “Mastering A Budget” provided me with the motivation and tools to create a budget that is well suited for my lifestyle and goals. I highly recommend this course to everyone!

“Having graduated with a significant amount of student debt, I realized I needed to be more aware of my budget and how I spend my money. However, I did not have much insight on how to properly manage my finances let alone having a game plan on how to do so. This course not only helped provide me a fundamental understanding on budgeting, but was also very concise and easy to follow. To anyone that wants to better understand budgeting but doesn’t know where to start, I would definitely recommend this course.”

If you want to learn how to start a budget, sign up to receive this free guide on creating a budgeting tool that works for you.

4. Get rid of debt.

We use the snowball method to tackle debt. Trust someone who has a lot of it – this part is no fun, but necessary. I decided that I would not feel financially free until I remove the debt completely. I did not want to wait for a government to remove it 20-25 years later. I know myself well enough to understand that I would psychologically feel the burden of my debt until it was completely gone. If I had chosen a loan forgiveness plan, I would not only depend on the government’s promise to pay off the debt, but I would also be completely dependent on my job. Dependency on a job was the last thing I wanted. Here is why:

My father was very dependent on his job – he had a family to support. He had to do things that were not aligned with his values in order to keep his work. His job as a sales engineer was stressful for him, as his higher-ups dumped uncomfortable confrontations between the factory and the company on their middle man. He then had to give up his pride as he went on to his second job as a janitor for Staples on weeknights. When that ended, he worked at Hollywood Video pushing tapes at a check-out stand alongside high-school teenagers. When we were older, he worked weekends at Robinson’s May, where his boss who paid him minimum wage forced him to miss the important things in life – like his children’s performances and sports matches. He finally quit his retail job when his boss threatened to fire him because he did not want to work on Christmas Eve. I remember the night he came home. He seemed very proud of standing up for what is right, but also, a bit beaten by a system holding him down. After watching my father go through that, I vowed to fight for my financial freedom so that all his sacrifices and hard work were not in vain.

5. Save as much money as possible.

This may seem like basic advice, but seriously, be as frugal as possible. We experimented with many ways to pinch pennies, such as eating rice and beans for a whole week, as well as taking on a room-mate as a married couple. All of my frugal challenges can be found here. I would highly recommend implementing as many frugal life-hacks as you can!

6. Build an emergency fund.

An emergency fund can reflect your risk tolerance. We are both risk averse people. I wanted to have a healthy buffer via an emergency fund in preparation for unexpected expenses. Some budgeting strategies allow for flexibilities within the budget so that emergency funds are unnecessary. Despite keeping additional savings in each category of our budget for unexpected events, we still keep a separate emergency reserve. I know it’s traditionalist, but diversifying financial strategies is one way we prepare for the future. In order to speed up the process, keep your money reserved in a high-yield savings account. We have opened an account with Marcus, and you can use this referral link to earn an additional 0.2% APY for up to 3 months.

7. Invest in the future.

We could have easily been close-minded and focused on attacking my student debt wholly. But I wanted to be very well-rounded in our financial approach, so we made sure to contribute to our 401-K retirement accounts (we each have one) along the way. Even though it means slowing down our loan repayment progress, it also meant diversifying our assets in order to compensate for the ups and downs life might throw our way. If you do not have a business or work for a company that provides a 401-K account, look into opening up a Roth IRA.

8. Look to real estate.

Rent in California is not cheap. Once we set up our 401-K’s, removed credit card debt, and funneled our hard-earned dollars towards my student debt with auto-payments, we started to look at buying a home because we viewed renting as a sure-fire way to throw away money. We had saved an emergency fund in step 5, and essentially used that emergency fund as a down-payment. Being the avid finance people that we were, we had been eyeing the market for the past two years. This allowed us to know the price point within our budget, as well as knowing the best bang for buck in our particular area. We ended up purchasing a commercially zoned live/work loft which is considered both a business and a residence for less than my student debt! Since we spent some of the emergency fund money, the minute we bought the house, we started all over again and grew our emergency fund back to what it was over the course of the next year.

9. Create passive income streams.

On top of our jobs, which provides active income streams, we wanted to set up sources of passive income. I have alluded to a few of those passive income streams above. One passive way to build wealth is our Marcus Savings Account, which gains interest over time and builds our emergency fund. Another is our 401-K, which gains interest over time and builds our retirement fund. A third is our room-mate which helps pay down our mortgage and build equity. Even this blog brings in passive income from past posts via affiliate links. I like things that continue to grow even when left alone. There are many ways you can create passive income, and I would definitely set yourself up for success in those venues because you never know what will happen to your active income stream.

10. Earn more money.

There are many ways to earn more money. I personally love the side-hustle. In the past few years, I have been a dog-sitter on Rover, worked at a bakery, opened my own bakery, baby-sat, made wedding favors, signage and decorations, sold my stuff on Poshmark, and wrote on this blog. I am not trying to sound insensitive to the effects of COVID on many people’s work lives. The opposite is actually true. I want to instill hope that there are ways to earn money all the time. People just have to think outside the box. A few examples relevant to this time in particular:

baby-sitting so that WFH parents can focus for at least an hour a day
tutoring to help kids who have fallen behind in their schooling
meal-prepping for over-extended parents and family members
financial planning or guidance for those who want to get out of debt accrued this year
mental health services for those who suffer from stress or depression
online yoga classes via ZOOM (so what if you’re not a certified yoga instructor?)
create websites for small businesses that need a digital place to grow
a longer list in my previous post: The Ever-Growing List Of Ways To Earn Extra Income.
for early morning people, check out these 15 early morning jobs to jump start your day!

I know these are only a few examples, but before you can find ways to earn extra income, you need to first give yourself permission to do so. It’s possible you may find that you are the only one stopping yourself from making more money!

Despite Mike not working since February, despite COVID, despite dental offices closing down temporarily, I feel a strong sense of certainty that taking time off during this most stressful and precarious time is the right move for living a balanced life. I only speak for myself, but have found that in doing so, other people have reached out to ask just how.

I hope this has been somewhat helpful, but I know that none of this happened over night. Small steps every day is what it takes to create the space for change. If it feels too over-whelming to think about, try to start with Step 1. Write down your wildest dreams, your values, the things that excite you… Then go from there.

I want to sincerely offer advice so as always, do not hesitate to reach out if you need a helping hand with getting started or finding your way. If you want to read more, here are a few posts you may be interested in.

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Monthly Goals: November 2020

This month’s goals come at a very interesting time for me personally.

The reason being, I have decided to quit my dentistry job.

I have decided to quit dentistry for many reasons.

I have lost meaning in my daily work.
I felt under-appreciated by a changing health-care system that prioritizes customer service over health itself.
I felt that I could not balance the expectations of my patients, the expectations of my workplace, and my own personal expectations.
My values are not aligned with where I am currently working.
I wanted to spend the holiday season with family and focus on the people that matter to me.
I was feeling burnt out and knew that if I did not give myself a break, I would grow to resent what I do for a living.
I want to live an intentional life, which means curating out the things that do not bring me joy.
We have made the lifestyle choices (invest money, spend less, own less, avoid having kids, avoid a large mortgage) necessary to avoid job dependency.
We have created the boundaries necessary to ignore social expectations and pressures, thus giving us freedom to live how we want.

Despite this freedom, I still have goals. But without the job identity, the goals have shifted slightly.

I think that quitting was very cathartic for me. I admit feeling stressed the last few months, mostly because I was holding on desperately to something I should have let go many months ago. I was fighting an internal battle, one between the past self and future possibility. Finally turning in an official resignation letter did just the trick.

It wasn’t very easy. I felt depressed for a few days, afraid of what I had done, anxious about the future. It’s like any ole break-up. It feels easier to run back to what is familiar and feels safe, even after you’ve outgrown the past. It takes a lot of reserve to not turn back. Luckily, the sadness and fear did not last long. After I sat through my emotions, I started to really notice a shift in my personality.

I sang songs randomly, after years of refusing to listen to music in case it over-whelmed my mind.
I smiled more frequently, and was more open to socializing. I connected with a high school friend, decided to make time for my grandma’s birthday party, and even drove to East LA on a Friday evening after work to grab tacos with my mother-in-law at a stand that she used to eat tacos at when she was my age.
I picked up old habits, like learning about photography, doing art, and playing guitar.
I connected with my husband more, rekindling our dumb banter from the college days.

For November’s monthly goals, I am sharing with you a TIME OFF BUCKET LIST. Even though my time off doesn’t start until November 19, I have decided not to wait until my last day of work to start living life to the fullest. This bucket list contains a number of goals I have always wanted to accomplish but have put on pause in order to partake in an American Dream.

As some people already know from my Instagram, we are taking a few long trips over the course of three weeks from November to December. I have lived in California since 1998 and I have yet to actually see it. I find that a shame.

It’s got me thinking, how much of our life are we actually wasting away doing things that don’t really matter in exchange for stuff that don’t really make us happy?

Not that I have the answers.

Just that I am trying to figure it out.

TheDebtist’s TIME OFF BUCKET LIST

Create Spotify playlists for different occasions and moods
Improve Photography Skills
Learn French
Improve Guitar Skills
Explore California National Parks
Visit old friends
Write a book – and self-publish it
Create more courses
Get into artwork again
Visit a Japanese spa (because we can’t go to Japan)
Go to a butterfly sanctuary
Go birdwatching in the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary
Explore tide pools for hours
“Live” on a farm – milk a cow or extract honey from a beehive
Learn recipes of my homeland from my mom
Hug a Redwood tree
Tour a lighthouse
Learn to make alfajores
Bake someone’s wedding cake
Do a cold bath dunk
Bake the following from the Tartine Book: Gingerbread Cookies, Spiked Cocktail Nuts, Brownies, Chocolate Pots de Crème, Devil’s Food Layer Cake, Lemon Meringue Cake, Pastel de Tres Leches
Eat Pho for the first time (yes!)
Learn how to make ramen from Mike
Master a few advanced level yoga poses
Learn how to sit on my hands

I add the last one, because just like anything, I always dive headfirst into something new, including this “mini-retirement”. Supposedly it’s a chance for me to figure myself out. Somehow I have to balance that with living life to the fullest. Like I said before, I’m still figuring it out. But honestly, thank you for joining me on this wild ride.

If you have any other bucket list ideas, do share! Who knows when my next mini-retirement will be.

The Real Reason Doctors Can’t Pay Down Their Student Debt

I was sitting at work once (and many times after), talking to colleagues of mine who were all in their early thirties – fairly young by doctor standards. We were talking about student loans (what else?) and how steep the price has become to get an education (in this case dental, but it applies to education in general). We were going through our numbers and they were going through their excuses as to why it was impossible in their situation to pay down debt. Of course, me being me, I gently stated the obvious which was that the real reason doctors “can’t” pay down their student debt was because they thought they deserve more than everyone else.

This statement may hurt many doctors’ feelings, but actually, it’s true.

For example. I had one person complaining about drowning in student debt. He blamed it on the kids and the fact that he is a single income household. Fine. But he also just bought a brand new Tesla SUV. He gets a nanny to watch his kids so that it’s easier on his stay-at-home wife. He gets help (did he say $100k a year??) from his in-laws that is budgeted for the kids. His dining out bill is $800 a month. But he can’t afford his student debt.

Another person also bought a brand new car after graduation, enrolled his 6-month old in Montessori private school, took wild vacations (without travel hacking!), and bought a grand house for their family of three.

Yet another person owns two medical-grade massage chairs in his home, bought his girlfriend a Tesla, and drops $10k on trips around the world.

What if I told you that this story is repeated many times over? I have spoken with my fair share of indebted graduates, especially after releasing my own personal story with ChooseFI.

They all wish to banish their student debt. They also don’t wish to do the work.

Here’s the thing I see most often with doctors. They work very diligently to get through school. They do anything to get to their dream career, including taking out a huge sum of moolah (hell, I did too). They sacrifice the best of their young years. They put off buying a home, earning money, and settling down. Then graduation hits and they think, “I’ve made it.” For a brief second, they breathe a sigh of relief thinking it’s all going to be worth it.

So they buy a new car to celebrate. Then they buy a home or a practice. They go out every weekend for food. Sometimes they dine out a few times a week! They want to live in affluent communities. They want to go on vacation. They throw themselves a dream wedding. They buy nice clothes and expensive Figs scrubs. But more than all this are the little purchases. They want the daily coffee, the trinkets from the $5 section in Target, the happy hour events, the spin class – you know, the harmless stuff.

They become obsessed with the high-life and quite quickly, they refuse to give it up.

And if you think I’m being extreme, I’m not.

Because when I graduated, I wanted all these things, too!

The most excruciating part about facing my student debt, the part that nearly killed me, was realizing that after every sacrifice and sleepless night, after giving up the best of my youth, after working three jobs during school, after wracking my brain on ways to extend $40 for another week, after being a model student, the good daughter, the most loyal employee, the most valuable I could be to the community – the work was still not done.

And when I tell new grads coming to me for advice on making loans disappear that they have to use their beat-up high-school ride, possibly move-in with their parents or take on a roommate, cook dinner every night, manage a budget every week, wear their same scrubs from dental school for five more years, and try their darndest to travel for FREE – well, their faces fall and I can see the disappointment plain as day scrawled on their furrowed brows.

Only thing is, I can’t tell if the disappointment lies in the fact that they have to continue living like a college kid for ten more years or if the disappointment lies in me – because I wasn’t the magic genie they wanted that would grant them their wish.

I can tell you how to repay your loans. You just might not like it.

99% of graduates with more than $350k of debt choose to stay with loan forgiveness. Probably because it hurts the human psyche too much to know that everything you’ve done thus far is not enough.

Becoming a doctor does not end the day you graduate. Not for me. It ends the day everything you need to become a doctor is behind you. Loans included.

Not everyone thinks this way, though. Many people truly believe that the hardship stops the day you get the degree. Ahhh, time to sit back and enjoy the benefits of all our hard work. But how can that be when you don’t even know what a hard-earned dollar looks like?! What makes you better than the rest of ’em?

I know I’m making enemies here but I must pose the question. If not I, who will?

I don’t blame the docs. They were merely children when they signed their lives away for a chance at the American Dream. I blame our upbringing for creating the expectation that a doctor’s life is a rich and easy one. I blame the institutions that are set in place that allow universities to charge this much money to get educated. I also blame lending companies who are handing out loans this large. Child robbery, that’s what I call it.

I implore to all the existing doctors that make it seem like being a doctor is easy. How will we ever change the trajectory if we keep implying to young ‘uns that pursuing this career path will mean they won’t have to work hard for the rest of their life. How will they realize and make an informed decision when the time comes?

I know the real truth.

That behind the facade of wealth is an increasingly long list of medical professionals patiently waiting 25 years for loan forgiveness to hit. Behind every confident thrust of the credit card is an avoidance technique that makes life a bit easier to live. Behind all our heroics and saving lives lies a coward afraid to face our social responsibility to pay back debt that we chose to take out. And behind every accomplishment lies a lifestyle creep that is avalanching too fast out of our reach, propelling doctors further forward towards an unsustainable way of living.

The real reason doctors “can’t” pay back student debt is because they won’t.

They choose not to work hard anymore. It isn’t burn-out, although that stuff is real too. It’s the social expectation that a doctor’s life is breezy. The mindset to pay back debt just isn’t there. Many cannot accept that graduation is not the end-game. They think they already won.

There will be excuses. I don’t buy any of it.

There will come a day when I will finish my loan repayment journey, and people will think it’s a miracle. They’ll think I was one of the lucky ones, rather than a penny-pinching maniac. Perhaps the stars aligned and the pandemic gave me this “unique” ability to pay back loans faster because I was not being charged interest for six months. My parents must have helped me out. An investment strategy probably worked out for me but not them. I can’t wait to see the excuses they make. But none of that will be true.

My current car is a high-school ride that I’ve had for 13 years. The passenger’s rear-view mirror doesn’t match, because when someone broke it (probably to re-sell it), I didn’t want to pay an extra $60 to get one that was white when the stock color was black. Mike even helped me put it on the car myself because I didn’t want to pay a service fee at the auto shop. My neighbor came out of his garage this past week and looked at me funny when he saw me physically hand-washing my car. He said, “That’s … nice…” and walked away slowly.

I sometimes have to wipe graffiti off my windows, because I chose to live in a lower income neighborhood so that I could buy a business storefront AND a dwelling at a very low price. Last Friday night, it was getting ratchet at the club next door since they moved the party outdoors due to COVID restrictions. I’ve had to run away from my own home before when the riots first started and they fired fireworks at the cops.

I spent a third of last year working midnight shifts. I still wear my USC scrubs that I was forced to buy upon entering dental school in 2012. I run with the Nike’s that my husband bought me as a gift when I was attending dental school so that I could “be cool”. They used to be orange but now they’re mostly black. I sell my de-cluttered stuff on Poshmark. I research heavily in order to travel the world for FREE. I come home from work to work. I still actively budget every week. I aim to spend only $200 a month in groceries for the two of us and $150 a month in dining out. I created a lifestyle where my job is three blocks away, to reduce the gas I have to buy. TO REDUCE THE GAS I HAVE TO BUY. I spent my last birthday repainting our bathroom. We spent Mike’s birthday picking up birthday freebies. Heck, even our cat was free.

Do you know the real reason THIS doctor can pay off student debt?

Hard work and a willingness to.

It’s not rocket science.

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Frugal Challenge: Practice Minimalism

In my life (as it is now), minimalism came first. By practicing minimalism, everything good in my life fell into place, financial clarity being one of them. Every time I choose a life of less stuff, I enforce a habit of not relying on external stimuli to make me feel whole. I am also deconstructing a fallacy that we were taught from birth, one that says we can buy our way to happiness. Minimalism is, after-all, a modern by-product of Zen teachings on how happiness resides within ourselves and the worlds our minds create. Any external stimuli only prevents us from tapping into our inner state of calm or peace by acting as a distraction from true happiness. Without the material things to distract me, I am able to focus on the more important (non-material things) in my life, such as paying down $575k in student debt! I can confidently say that I would not have been as successful with finding frugality and working towards financial independence without first practicing the art of saying Goodbye, Things.

My frugal challenge for the month of October is to start practicing minimalism. After all, it goes hand-in-hand with frugality. Practicing minimalism can cut down costs in many ways. Here are a few!

LESS SHOPPING, ERGO LESS SPENDING: After you’ve de-cluttered a lot of your items, you will naturally develop a hesitancy with buying something again (unless it’s something you realized you really need or want). The de-cluttering process, when done right, is a tedious process for the average American because of how much stuff we tend to accumulate. I guarantee that once you’ve really pared down, buying things is not as attractive as it once was, which means you will spend less money on shopping.
LESS STUFF MEANS LESS LIVING SPACE: Having less things allow for a smaller home, which usually leads to cheaper rent! Many minimalists find that once they are freed from the burden of material objects, they are suddenly free to live alternative lifestyles, such as pursuing the small space movement! Housing is one of the largest expenses in most people’s budget, so reducing the cost of housing will greatly catapult your path towards financial freedom.
LESS UNNECESSARY SPENDING FOR REPAIRS AND REPLACEMENT. Minimalism is a lesson in being grateful for the things we already have. Because minimalists surround themselves with only their most beloved things, they are more likely to preserve, mend, and fix a broken thing than they are to throw it away and replace it. They aren’t going to buy things for convenience sake and they are more invested in maintenance. Because of this, they save more money.
LESS KEEPING UP WITH THE JONES’S: Minimalists do not participate in keeping up with the Jones’s. In fact, they think the Jones’s are making a dying, rather than making a living. And minimalists prefer to live life rather than work themselves to death in order to buy material goods. And since minimalists do not participate in upward social comparisons, they are not as easily influenced or frequently bombarded by and with advertisements. They aren’t called upon to be consumers. And if they are, the calling is easily ignored. Overall, they don’t spend money in order to keep an appearance. Minimalists save their dollars, preferring to build wealth rather than build social status.
LESS STRESS RELIEF BINGES. When we are stressed, we tend to spend in order to make ourselves feel better. We want to take a vacation to run away from stressful work. We go out to drink during happy hour after a difficult 8-5. We binge on food and eat our misery away. We even have retail therapy. A practice in minimalism leads to more space physically, emotionally, and mentally. Minimalism reduces stress by reducing the external stimuli in our environments. With all this Zen, there is less cost dedicated to stress relief practices.
NO EXPENSIVE FRIVOLOUS EVENTS. Minimalists do not want to celebrate big life events with lavish parties, nor do they want to receive a tower of gifts. What will they do with all of this stuff? I may be speaking for myself, but my ideal celebration involves people and homemade food in a warm setting. I like gatherings in small spaces because you can feel the presence of others and there’s no nooks and crannies to hide in and stare lovingly into your phone. A good example of this was our wedding. We got married in an empty warehouse and the decor was handmade. My father tied gold streamers onto a string, and I made a backdrop for the photobooth area. My aunt collected wild flowers and put them in vases, and Mike’s grandmother made cookies and her famous magic bars. Our friends provided local beer for the reception as their wedding gift. We hired a taco truck and had donuts for desert. I’d imagine the same would go for children’s parties, funerals, graduation, & c. No frivolous events means no expensive events!

These are just a few ways that minimalism can help build a frugal lifestyle. The truth is, minimalism goes a step further than frugality. When I became a minimalist, I reduced the distractions in my life. I honed in on who I was and what made me happy. Because of this recently tapped in energy, I performed better at work and increased my income. I then found a few interests that became side hustles (writing being one of them). This further allowed me to make more money. And as I became happier, I also became less dependent on buying my way to happiness. My work made me happy, and I funneled even more time into my passions. And so the cycle snowballed, and slowly, our debt repayment changed from 25 years to 10 years to 9 year, to 7 years, to hopefully less than 6 years! All because I got rid of my things.

As all minimalists argue, if minimalism involves shedding physical burdens in the form of material possessions in order to be liberated to live the life that really matters, why isn’t is called maximalism? Frugal maximalism.