Dr. Preston Cherry is the Founder and President of Concurrent Financial Planning, a company dedicated to aligning clients' wealth with their well-being. Recognized as one of the top financial advisors in the US by Investopedia, Dr. Cherry is a Certified Financial Planner™ professional and a Certified Financial Therapist™ who has made significant contributions to his field. He serves as the Head of Financial Planning Program and Director of the Charles Schwab Center for Personal Financial Planning at UW-Green Bay and is a past president of The Financial Therapy Association. Passionate about advancing the human condition through financial education, Dr. Cherry holds a PhD in personal financial planning and is the author of Wealth in the Key of Life, which explores the interconnectedness of life and money.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
[2:37] Dr. Preston Cherry discusses how Concurrent Financial Planning helps clients align their wealth with their well-being
[3:56] The interconnectedness of life and money in achieving happiness
[7:57] How to treat money as a partner in life's journey
[11:57] The power of permitting oneself to pursue wealth and well-being
[17:08] Dr. Cherry shares the challenges and solutions for couples navigating financial planning together
[26:20] Addressing the dynamic of cultural differences in financial planning
[30:39] The significance of agreeing on shared values to prioritize household spending
[37:56] How parents and mentors greatly influence one's approach to money and life
In this episode…
In today’s fast-paced world, achieving financial harmony has become essential for living a fulfilled life. However, the pursuit of financial success often overshadows our fundamental well-being, creating a tense relationship with money. So, how can we reshape our relationship with money to align it with our deepest aspirations?
Dr. Preston Cherry, a seasoned financial advisor and author, shares his unique approach to overcoming the barriers people face in achieving their desired life. He introduces the concept of financial harmony, emphasizing the importance of aligning one's financial decisions with personal values and life goals. Through insightful anecdotes and candid discussion, he challenges the notion that money is merely a tool, advocating instead for seeing it as a vital partner in life. By giving money a persona and recognizing its role in achieving life goals, individuals can find permission to pursue their dreams and aspirations without seeking external validation.
In this episode of The Customer Wins, Richard Walker interviews Dr. Preston Cherry, Founder and President of Concurrent Financial Planning, about creating financial harmony. Dr. Cherry discusses how Concurrent Financial Planning helps clients align their wealth with their well-being, the interconnectedness of life and money in achieving happiness, the power of permitting oneself to pursue wealth and well-being, and the challenges and solutions for couples navigating financial planning together.
Resources Mentioned in this episode
Wealth in the Key of Life: Finding Your Financial Harmony by Dr. Preston Cherry
"How Psychometrics Can Revolutionize Your Workforce With Jason P. Carroll" on The Customer Wins
"[AI Series] Tailoring Client Acquisition in Finance With AI With Farbod Nowzad" on The Customer Wins
"Scaling Communities and Operations Excellence for RIAs With Shaun Kapusinski" on The Customer Wins
"Innovating Fiduciary Risk Assessment for Growth With Mark Friedenthal" on The Customer Wins
Quotable Moments:
"Life and money are partners; they're dancing to the same song."
"It’s okay to earn money and earn it abundantly."
"Money buys more units of happiness if you're investing in your well-being."
"Let your life lead your money, not your money lead your life."
"The permission starts with the audacity of having the thought and saying it out loud to yourself."
Action Steps:
Reevaluate your relationship with money: Understanding that money is not just a tool, but a partner in your life with a vital role helps to align financial goals with personal values, addressing challenges related to self-worth and financial anxiety.
Grant yourself permission to pursue financial goals: Giving yourself the audacity to pursue what you value without needing external validation empowers you to take risks and make decisions that align with your personal aspirations, addressing the common fear of failure or judgment from others.
Establish a healthy dialogue about money with partners: For couples, creating a welcoming environment to discuss financial aspirations and perspectives openly addresses the challenge of navigating different financial mindsets and helps build a unified approach to shared financial goals.
Invest in self-worth and personal value: This action addresses the internal barriers that prevent individuals from realizing their potential and making confident financial decisions.
Embrace a life and money balance: Continuously working to ensure that your financial strategies are in harmony with your life goals helps you adapt to life changes and maintain a sense of well-being.
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Episode Transcript:
Intro 0:02
Welcome to The Customer Wins podcast where business leaders discuss their secrets and techniques for helping their customers succeed and in turn grow their business.
Richard Walker 0:16
Hi, I'm Rich Walker, the host of The Customer Wins, where I talk to business leaders about how they help their customers win and how their focus on customer experience leads to growth. Some of my past guests have included Jason Carroll of Aptive Index, Farbod Nowzad of Cashmere AI Shaun Kapusinski of HIFON, and Mark Friedenthal of Tolerisk. Today, I'm speaking with Dr. Preston Cherry, author of Wealth in the Key of Life, and the founder and CEO of Concurrent Financial Planning. And today's episode is brought to you by Quik!, the leader in enterprise forms processing. When your business relies upon processing forms, don't waste your team's valuable time manually reviewing the forms instead, get Quik!. Using our Form Xtract API, simply submit your completed forms and get back clean context-rich data that reduces manual reviews to only one out of 1000 submissions. Visit quikforms.com to get started.
Man, I'm so excited to introduce today's guest, Dr. Preston Cherry. Dr. Cherry is the founder and CEO of Concurrent Financial Planning and brings over 18 years of experience in financial services and academia. He's on a mission to align clients' wealth with their well-being, focusing on creating what he calls financial harmony in people's lives. Dr. Cherry doesn't stop at just financial planning. He's also the director of the Financial Planning Program and the Charles Schwab Foundation Center for Financial Wellness at UW-Green Bay. His impressive background includes being a PhD in personal financial planning, a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER professional and a certified financial therapist. He's led in many professional spaces, including serving as a past president of The Financial Therapy Association. In addition to his financial planning work, Dr. Cherry is the author of the book Wealth in the Key of Life, and a well-recognized speaker featured in publications like The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. He's even been honored by Investopedia as one of the top financial advisors in the country. Preston, welcome to The Customer Wins.
Dr. Preston Cherry 2:16
Thank you, Rich.
Richard Walker 2:18
Man. I'm so happy you're here. So for those who haven't heard this podcast before, I talk with business leaders about what they're doing to help their customers win, how they built and deliver great customer experience, and the challenges to growing their own company. Preston, I want to understand your business a little bit better. How does your company help people? And how does your book going to help people?
Dr. Preston Cherry 2:37
Oh, thank you. Yes, this is what I want to do Rich, is advance the human condition through financial advice and education. And it really is about humanity and the partnership with money, life and money together, how can we have permission to grab hold of the life that we want. So many times folks, maybe have a barrier, a boundary, or need a boost, an area, to just grab hold of the life that they want right now, because it really hasn't been such up to this point, or it's there in such a way, but they want to boost it in just a step further. Not just, maybe that's just that worldly growth, but growth in their life, the way they imagine and envision it. That's what we want to do.
Richard Walker 3:38
There's so much in this. Like I said, I'm so excited to talk today, because there's so many aspects of this conversation aspects of this conversation I want to get into, but, but let's keep it simple. Doesn't the way you live depend on the money you have? Oh, aren't they highly just intertwined? How do you get more out of life, if you don't have the money?
Dr. Preston Cherry 3:56
Absolutely you're hitting the nail on the head, and that's all. Listen, people say all the time, they say, well, money's just a tool, or life is more than money. Well, that's kind of downplaying money's role a little bit. First of all, the word just gets on my nerves, right? Money's just a tool, as though it's not important. It's not. It's relegated to this kind of like side thing, right? And no, money is not just a tool, it's a partner with a soul, because both of those have souls, and it's essential part of life, okay? Now, when you approach money in that way, then you have interconnectedness, and when you have interconnectedness.
Now, money has its hit, its vital role, and now it's defined, and now you can, I say you I mean individuals, folks, right? They can say, It's okay to earn money and earn it abundantly, because there's two different things between the worship of money, which is maladaptive, if your self-worth is tied to your net worth, okay, then there has yet to be any work being done to actually investigate the self, to see what you value most in life. Now there's the second part of that is, is understanding the value of money and what it can do and you can thrive with life and money by saying, I want to abundance of both. Because what the misconception is, is that folks are not worthy of abundance, or they want to put money aside and say, I don't want to be seen as a money monger, or something to this effect, some all of this, right?
So that's why it's very important to highlight the essentialness of money, the role it plays, and also allowing oneself to have permission to thrive the way you want to on your own path, and then invest in those areas. I'll wrap it up with this, which is, this is the essential meaning of life and money alignment, giving money assignments.
Richard Walker 6:27
Okay, so a couple things you said in there, it sounds like you're giving money a persona in your life, whatever that means to you when you give to this assignment of being your partner. And so I don't know if you want to elaborate on that, but the second part I wanted to get into is this idea of permission. And I want to tell you a story. So I started my first business when I was 12. I took $300 of an investment, turned it into over $1,100 in one day during the business cycle of selling this water toy that I created. And I mean, this is back in 1985 86 so it was a lot of money, especially for a 12-year-old, I suddenly realized people give you things. They give you money if you give them what they want. And so is this, like, wait, I could actually become wealthy.
So I started telling everybody from age 13 and on that I would be a millionaire by age 23 and I remember my mom, when I was 21 years old, saying, Rich, stop saying you're gonna be a millionaire by 23 she's like, I'm so concerned you're gonna fail and be incredibly disappointed and upset and negative, et cetera. The interesting thing though, Preston is that in my head, it was just a number. It really wasn't, did I do it or not? I wasn't gonna be disappointed if I didn't, and by the way, I didn't, but I did have my dream car, so I had some level of success. I just looked at it as I'm shooting for the stars, and if all I do is get out of the atmosphere, I'm better than most people who are still on the ground, but I'm kind of curious now. I mean, maybe that's some context to leverage from. But what is the permission and what should the person of money be?
Dr. Preston Cherry 7:57
Right? Yeah, there was this movie called Mystic River, and had Sean Pan and a couple other folks in it. And there was a scene in the movie, and he said, has anybody seen Just Ray? And everybody was like, No, we have it. He said, By the way, why y'all call him Just Ray? And they said, well, in the neighborhood, all the Rays were taken, big Ray, little ray. So the only thing was left was Just Ray. So that became his nickname, right? And who wants to be called, Just right? And so that's where I came up with money is just a tool which is off repeated and for most, then there becomes this justification of why you are investing, when I say investing, I mean allocating your dollars to the parts of life that you value most. Why justify it? Why explain your aspiration, your preferences in life, the things that you value, or the areas that you value most, including things. Why justify that and why discount or downplay money's importance, when you are working hard for the money, right? When you're working hard for the money, I think that's a song for the money, right?
And when you're working hard for the money, you are exchanging a part of your human capital, your toil every day, yourself in exchange for earning those dollars. So that is a soul-bound transaction, all right, and then you are also transferring those dollars into areas of your life to which you value. It may be family it may be lifestyle purchases, it may be the future, it may be all that. Right? So the what your story is, punch me in the face with is, there was a investigation, there was a thought process of saying, where do I want to be? What do I don't want to do anymore? Second part is, what do I do want to do? And then that's called aspiration. And I like to share all the time that there's two different glues in the world. There's got the Elmer glue and you got the gorilla glue. And then when you when you have that aspiration, Richard, this is what I heard from your story is that you had a guiding compass. He was like, you I have aspiration. You asked yourself questions. You had some reflective work. Oh, yeah. And then you had some work to do, sure, so that's what I got from that.
Richard Walker 11:00
Yeah. I mean, we grew up poor, and that's why I said I was surprised that people would give me so much money in one day for something that they wanted. I didn't expect to sell out in five hours, but I did, and it taught me that I can be anything I want to be. I can go and go forward, but I keep coming to this idea of this permission. Do I need to ask permission of how I felt about my mom's attitude because she raised me about money. Do I have to ask the world's permission, or is it just myself? And maybe this comes back.
I mean, when you think about being a financial advisor and you're trying to help people achieve, in my view, their goals and dreams, we often relegate that to, oh, it's a retirement plan. It's your kids going to school. I think it's different, though, because what do you want to do with that money? What is it empowering you to do to have the experience you want in your life? So how would you like? Sorry, maybe I'm being a little bit too detailed on this, but what are all the different types of permissions you see customers go through?
Dr. Preston Cherry 11:57
Yeah, life, money balance. When I coined the phrase, it specifically says, Let your life lead your money, not your money lead your life. So your life and money working concurrently to achieve your life's design, therein lies the permission, right there. First of all, it starts with self-worth and self-value. That's something I received from my parents. These are compoundable assets, Rich, and not too many people in the world get these on a consistent basis, coming up as a youth, consistent being believed in, all right, being valued, being loved, being supported, all of this, all these inputs, and they build up self-worth and self-value. And if you have these two assets in oneself, that's your first permission. Is that, Are you worthy? Or do you value yourself enough to go after what you need to go after or allocate your time, your energy, your soul, your money, into what you value most? And there's a couple of studies, you know, that we all ask about ourselves.
It's like because money buy you happiness? What my answer says, Yes, it does, and should people do? Yeah? People say, oh, you can't say that out loud, or you're wrong, and all this stuff. Well, there was a study that we were all public is pretty familiar with, because they've often repeated. It's like, okay, well, after 75,000, happiness plateaus a little bit, right? And I'm like, Well, how about let me participate in that study. Why don't you give me the 150,000 Yeah, right. And let me participate in that study. See how happy I am. And then later on down the line, there was a study that said, Yes, you can achieve happiness with higher incomes. And then these two studies came together, and what it found is that yes, money does buy happiness, pretty much perpetually, by far as income is concerned, that said, if you are struggling with your emotion, if you're already embedded with some sort of negative, internal negativity, maladaptive behavior, thought process, then no amount of money is going to fix that Rich. What that tells us is that we have to do our own work to see what we value and what we want out of life so you can buy more units of that happiness. And it could be health.
It could be coming out of a struggle doing what you don't want to do, to do what you want to do. You're investing in betterment. Not to confirm, but your own betterment. Yeah, right. You're investing in well-being, and I'll get to this a little later. You're investing into your well-being. So those units of well-being are happiness. So the permission is, is first, are you worthy of going after what you need to go after? Do you value yourself enough to go after, and then having the audacity to set forth in that journey without, this is the permission, without explanation to others, very important, and with that, releases unnecessary energy that may be dispelled in other utilize you're given in other areas, kind of like watching what people are doing. You're moving your neck to the left or to the right. Instead of saying focus, if you can reclaim that energy and focus on your life aspiration, then you have a greater probability of achieving what you want to achieve.
Richard Walker 11:57
So I have to, I can give you my answer about money buying happiness, and it's always been when money buys you happiness, spend the money. So I love this permission idea, because really, what you're saying is, in my view, is you're giving yourself the permission to do the work, to get to where you want to be, to take the risk to get to where you want to be. And I often think about like, okay, so I want to take more vacations. Just as an example, I need to make more money to do that. I'm in a job where I can't do that, so therefore I can't take more vacations. The permission is go get a different job, get a different industry, change careers altogether, start a side hustle, new business, whatever it is. And I think a lot of people look, I'm an entrepreneur.
I give myself permission all the time, because that's what entrepreneurs do. But I think a lot of people are afraid to be entrepreneurs, because they're afraid to take that step. And you're using money, kind of as a tip of the spear, of the path you're trying to go down to say, if the money is the answer, because that gives you the things you the things you want. It enables and empowers the things you want. Then yes, give yourself the permission to go pursue it.
Dr. Preston Cherry 17:08
And the thought that the permission starts with the audacity of having the thought and saying it out loud to yourself and not having to say, for instance, when you're talking about vacations, right? You say, oh, okay, me and my family want to take a vacation, and you may spend 20, $30,000 if you have that type of space in your budget, right? It could be $1,000 it's relative to what you have all right. Now, let's just say, with the higher incomes, because folks won't say out loud sometimes, no, it doesn't mean that you have to go around and boasting and saying, oh, yeah, I spent $30,000 on this family vacation or anything like that. But some people have either survivors guilt or justification and be like, oh, we could have not spent $30,000 maybe we spent 20, and then we invested the 10 and all this other stuff. No, you spent what you spent. I mean, if you say out loud, I want to take a vacation without worry, take either your you and your spouse or you and your family say, and not worry about our budget or our current and future goals, all right?
We set aside money for that, and this is what we're going to go do. That's the permission, right? Instead of having internally, I just went through kind of a role play. Is like, oh, we could have done this. And then externally is, oh, you did what, you took three weeks off, or you took two weeks off. What did you do there? Oh, we did this. Oh, well, you mean that you're not taking care. Hold up. Hold the breaks. First of all, I had this little term. It says, I put a little spin on, mind your business. I put an MF in there, right? Mind your own MF business, right? And because you need it just, it gives you some permission. I don't explain nothing to you, because if you have your preferences set, your purpose, your points in life, which is life, stage, vitality, and you have a plan, right, then this is where the permission is, is to say, man, we're gonna go on vacation and not worry about it, because we've taken care of all the internal accountability and all that already, it's bold. You say, hey, let's go do it.
Richard Walker 19:25
Yeah, I think a lot of people, this is my anecdote, my guess, because you may have the statistics on it, but I would think that most people go after wealth for their well-being, first and foremost. I started a company because I thought I could become a millionaire. I could, you know, build something really big and make me wealthy. As I progress, I realize I'm helping people. But I didn't start the business saying, oh, I'm going to make all this money so I can give it away a charity, right? I didn't say I want to drive a crap car so I can give away all the money to other people. I want to drive a nice car and I'm willing to work for it. To me, that's part of the permission.
I want to ask you a slightly different question. You must work with a lot of couples, and until you are married, your money is your money, and you're the only person having the conversation about your money. But once you get married, you suddenly realize there's all this other dynamic. They have a different perspective. They have different permissions, different rules and regulations in their minds. I don't think I've ever talked to a financial therapist. So how do you approach that with your clients? How do you help them through that kind of figuring it out, is that a problem?
Dr. Preston Cherry 20:29
Oh, you know, yes, I wouldn't say a problem, but is a challenge, right? It's a challenge that you want to overcome. It's an area that you must address, right? And I share with my wife all the time. I like a certain style or a certain potato chip, and she likes a certain potato chip. And when I get my potato chips, then I figured that she wouldn't want any, because she just, she don't like this, not her favorite, right? But then when I break the bag open, and I'm sitting over there, crunching, right, and she's all over my potato chips. All of a sudden, I said, Well, I thought you didn't like these. So we came up with a term, which is, what's mine is yours and what's yours is yours, right? So she is everything, right? We weren't teasing each other, but the point about it, it is about perspective.
It is about perspective and having a welcoming environment to talk about life and money aspiration, they didn't even just and we talked about, I don't want to come off as having toxic positivity that, in of itself, is not realistic, okay? What we are talking even for like health when you when you're investing in well-being, if you're not feeling well, and I share this in a chapter of a book in a period of my life, it, which was, here's the struggle. I figured out what I didn't want to do, but I figured out what I did want to do, but I had to have money in order to get well. Okay, far as my health and that investment is a form of happiness, so it's not pink cloudish. But was I in a better place than from where I was on my struggle to going through and seeking help and getting professional help, and the outcome, am I happier?
Yes, right. So when we talk about the couple's perspective. When you talk about perspective, what is that welcoming environment to work once or oneself, each of you and then your couple self through so you can achieve a goal. Here it goes. One, agree to agree.
Richard Walker 22:38
Okay, yes, you're married. You better agree with each other.
Dr. Preston Cherry 22:41
Yeah, agree and agree. Here's my example. Let's take that trip, for example. All right, agree that you want to take a trip to where you want to not worry about money, and you want to take this trip and be refreshed and be renewed and unplug, and this is what the trip is for. Can we agree to agree? At the macro level, yes, that's what we, so agree to agree. Then number two, agree to respect one another. Respect one another. We're in a welcome environment. Yes, we may have a couple of the tone may rise a little bit, maybe the voices may rise a little bit, but let's realize why we're here. We're going to welcome each other, we're going to trust each other, we're going to respect one another, right? So set the tone, set the environment for welcoming. Okay?
Number three, allow one person to present their perspective, because perspectives are important that someone may be expressing their past relationship and a vacation experience. Hey, now we're talking about experiences and attitudes with money, a past, present and future. So let's unpack that and see where we arrive with our different perspectives. So person one talks about their perspectives, life, money, attitudes, values, brings it all to the table as it pertains with this particular topic. Then person number two goes so we're on step four. Then number five is not to come together and not compromise, all right, because compromise sometimes is like, okay, somebody's got to give something up, yeah, but if you come together after this framework, then you're coming together to revisit part one, which is that agree to agree, after you went through the frameworks and heard the perspectives. Now we're going to come together and make what we agreed upon happen, because we now considering both of our perspectives.
Richard Walker 24:57
I like that. I like that man, and it's not just about money, it's not just about that vacation. It's about how we're going to live together and be with each other. And money, I think, is just a reflection of how we actually operate in general anyhow, if you see somebody spending and selfishly spending, I don't think they respect the spouse the other person, and that could just be because they didn't have the conversation. I'll disclose something about my own relationship with my wife, because it's interesting. She's half Chinese, so she comes from a Chinese family background where money is king, like you're valued by your money. You don't spend it, though, not allowed to spend it at all. So I'm very thankful that she does not like to spend money, but it's a fight sometimes to get her to spend the money.
Like I said, if it buys you the happiness, spend the money and setting aside money for certain goals and then not spending it is just, that kills things to me, but one of the things we did is I'm really good at managing risk and being okay with ups and downs in the bank account, for example. So I manage all the budget. She doesn't worry about that, and therefore she doesn't have to see that fluctuation as things move in and out of the account. So anyway, I think your framework is really, really smart to help people put it together. And is this something that somebody asks for? Is this something you traditionally do with your new clients?
Dr. Preston Cherry 26:20
Yeah, my clients, yes. And I just pulled together a whole bunch of stuff, you know, just being read in the field and all that. And I was like, okay, let's have, this is my version of the couples, right? You know, couples conflict, couples harmony, framework, right? People from couples conflict, to couples harmony, and so that was, that was just something I picked up, just through my travels, through the profession and all that, right? And I would also say, and I appreciated your story, but far as you and your wife, because it that resonated with me. Stories help people resonate Rich. Yeah, because they hit home and people said, okay, I could see myself in that. Or if they don't see themselves in it, at least they can say, ah, that spark something.
There was a feeling there, right? And it sparked something. So your story sparked something about my wife and I, we're multicultural home. I love approaching folks with a multicultural, global aspect, because that's what humanity is. And so my wife and I had to work through, I think, we had to work through levels of communication earlier in our couples hood, because we've been married for a year. We've known each other for eight. That's a whole another story, trust me, we dated for eight, and all this we had, there's a whole bunch of stuff there.
Richard Walker 27:43
Similar story, by the way, go on.
Dr. Preston Cherry 27:44
Yeah, well, there's immigration. We lived apart for two years because they documents, all right, we were going through our PhDs for four of them, so that we had cultural alignment, that we had to do. We had religiosity alignment we had to do. So that's why...
Richard Walker 28:02
You really came together, like you really worked through it.
Dr. Preston Cherry 28:04
We really worked through it, we really worked through it. So, when your story, it resonated because and then people were asking, well, Doc, you just gave us a framework. And, yeah, frameworks are just frameworks. How does that look like in real life? Well, let me tell you, that whole another story, part that dot, dot. That's the seven years. So we had to work through that and culturally, particularly being from the Middle East, and having a Muslim background, there's a lot of generosity in there, far as giving and supporting family and all that, right? And so there's a lot of that. How do we work that into our marriage? That's a perspective, you know, that's a value system, right? Yeah, right. No, it's not a system. It's a value belief, right? And so, but when I'm hearing that perspective, and she hears my perspective, now, how do we go about as a household? How are we going to go about helping family, just overall, just in spirit and support, and also financially? Yeah, so that's just one area. So thank you for sharing.
Richard Walker 29:21
And actually, you're bringing up something else I want to I'll tell you about is that, so my wife's from South Africa, and thankfully, she had already had her citizenship when I met her, so we didn't have to go through that process together. She had done that. But we're at a stage now where parents are aging, and so she's got family back in South Africa who are struggling with age-related things, and then she's got friends who are suffering because their economy is terrible. And she has her things that she likes to give to. So there's this balance that we're playing with each other all the time around what's important to our household, what's important to the extended household, what's important to us from a charitable giving standpoint, and how much do we give or can give?
And it's incredible, because if you give $25 US dollars, to somebody in South Africa that can buy them groceries for a week or two, and you think to yourself, that's like bagels and coffee. That's breakfast for two people, maybe, and I can buy groceries for an entire week. So how many times should I do that? But that's not why we started our business. That's not why we're trying to grow our wealth. Is just to do that, right? We don't want to give up our kids future and their welfare. So it's this dynamic your framework is not just a one-time thing. Is what I'm going to try to say. It's a constant, ongoing thing that happens throughout your life, right?
Dr. Preston Cherry 30:39
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely and that is life and money. Then that's why I say we circle all the way back is the partnership aspect of it. Your life and money are partners, and they have a soul, and they're dancing to the same song, all right, and to your point, life is a cycle. It is a continuum. All right, you never stop working and advancing and working through, working to, that's just what life is. Life is stages and I share with people all the time that the life stages are different, that you're going to have domains of life, life and money, that are going to mean more in one segment of your life stage than it is in another. And this is why I have this life money balance wheel in the book, and it has these three domains, which is money, psychology, utility, lifestyle utility and life-centered utility. And there had these sub-investments that you can make. And then it's a wheel, and they're integrated.
So if you spin the wheel, all right, the integration still remains, it's where you are in life, to where, what areas matter to you most around here, and how you go, what life stage you're in, and how are you going to consider the future, and then where are you going to allocate your dollars? Right? That will, what is the word I'm looking for, waiting. That will, the dichotomy is the wheel spinning of life. Yeah, it's continuous, yeah, it doesn't stop. You're not going to just have one conversation with your spouse about a trip. It's always going to be about giving, like you said. I just had a podcast about the supporting adult children. Oh, my goodness. People lost their minds with that. And they were like, oh, man, we have a 28 and a 30-year-old, and we're still doing this for them. But you know what? That's perspective Rich. Because you have one spouse that says, Oh, I don't want the kids to struggle.
Did you have another spouse to say, well, I was out at 18. Right. So the application of frameworks and working through and working to they're not endless, because at some point you start to get to some sort of efficiency after you...
Richard Walker 33:13
Actually, I wanted to point that out, because I think thankfully, my wife and I did the agree to agree up front with each other when we started from the moment. We lived together before we were married, et cetera. And one of the things that we both agree on is we would rather invest money into health now through good quality food and diet than money into health later, through medicine and procedures. And so that agreement that we both have means that if one of us goes out and spends a little extra on a supplement, a supplement, a superfood, a high quality, whatever food item, neither of us look at that and say, why'd you spend that money? It's never a condition of, did we do the right thing or not? Because we already agreed on it, and it becomes really easy to live life around what's going in our pantry now. So I think what your process does is it creates foundation for people, for couples, to live with, and even for yourself. If you agree, this is my goal, my goal is health and protecting my kids, and yes, I would love to have a nicer car. I'm still going to put those things first before I allocate the money to the nicer car.
Dr. Preston Cherry 34:17
Well, yeah, the datas, those are the areas that you and your wife value. You've done the work. All goes back to what we were talking about, right? You've done the work to find out what those well-being units are, and so you could purchase more of those units. All right? Now you don't have to have money, okay, to have good health. All right, stay with me here. You don't have to have money to go and enjoy nice weather, okay, all right, you can live life without an abundance of money and still achieve happiness. Okay? Yes, do that, however, that is a choice that folks are making because that's their preference, all right? That's their lifestyle choice and preference, and that's okay. And if that's your preference, that's fine too. That's fantastic. You don't need permission to explain that either, right? Just because somebody says,
Oh, I'm fine with the $30,000 a year or some of this effect. And somebody says, well, don't you have any ambition? Well, that person may not be wired like that. That person may be truly happy, more happy than you are, so to speak, right? But when a household says, oh, yeah, I want all the vitamin supplements in the world, right? Well, you've already had that discussion. You've already have your purpose, preference. You have your life stage that you consider your points in life. That's the other P, and you've had your plan. Then that call, then that equals prosperity again. You don't need permission from anyone else, and you don't have to justify it. And that includes it could be family that's important to you because you've done the work to identify that. And it could be a new car. I know folks. They're like, oh, well, people, they value too many material things. First of all, what's that got to do with you?
Richard Walker 34:54
Amen to that.
Dr. Preston Cherry 35:38
Yeah, what's that got to do with you? House or whatever it may be. What's that got to do with you? Both approaches are fine, because the values are particular to the individual. And if you have, I want to stress, if you have a plan and you've done the work, then how you allocate your dollars, it really doesn't matter to other folks. So it's the internal permission. We keep coming back to this is very important. Now we want folks to this is how we help people Rich. Because that was one of your questions, yeah, is to free folks to be one with themselves in the mirror, and for those that are inside their household and say it is okay to say these things, because it matters to who's in our household and what our plan is.
Richard Walker 37:16
Awesome, Man I want to keep talking, but I just realized we're running out of time. So before I get to my last question, what is the best way for people to find and connect with you Preston?
Dr. Preston Cherry 37:27
Oh, so all over socials is Dr. Preston Cherry, so, Dr. Preston Cherry, all over the socials, the podcast, Life, Money Balance on YouTube, The wealth management firms, concurrentfp.com, and the personal page where the book will be is drprestoncherry.com.
Richard Walker 37:47
Awesome. Okay, here's my last question, just to shake it up a little bit, who has had the biggest impact on your leadership style and how you approach your role today?
Dr. Preston Cherry 37:56
Without question and is a chapter in a book. It's because no one is self-made Rich, right? Love to believe this. They love that they're a self-made millionaire, right? No somebody believed in you, somebody invested in you, right? Somebody did it for you, and those somebodies, in my case, rich, is a whole long, long list of folks, but it's my parents and my mother and father, I appreciate them so much all the sacrifices they made from my sister and I to thrive and give us those two compoundable assets that I speak of, that self-worth and so value. I wouldn't be here today without many mentors. Faith as you find it, I'll leave that open bracket for people to approach faith how they like it, and parents.
Richard Walker 38:42
I love it, man, I love it. And I don't know if you know this, my mom and I started this business together and she's a huge influence on me, of course, too. Okay, I got to stop myself and just wrap this up. I want to give a huge thank you to Dr. Preston Cherry, author of Wealth in the Key of Life, and the founder and CEO of Concurrent Financial Planning, for being on this episode of The Customer Wins. Go check out Dr. Cherry's website at concurrentfp.com and drprestoncherry.com, and don't forget to check out Quik! at quikforms.com where we make processing forms easy. I hope you enjoyed this discussion, will click the like button, share this with someone and subscribe to our channels for future episodes of The Customer Wins. Preston, thank you so much for joining me today.
Dr. Preston Cherry 39:26
Thank you, Rich.
Outro 39:28
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