Why don’t friends ask more questions about your financial well-being? with Rich and Regular’s Julien and Kiersten Saunders

We ask about friends health, travel plans, and romantic relationships. But not about whether they are ok in their financial lives. Rich and Regular’s Kiersten and Julien Saunders share their experiences trying to get their friends to care more, and actually ask more about each others financial well-being, and money security. 

Julien + Kiersten Rich and Regular

Julien + Kiersten’s Money Story

Kiersten Saunders:
I quit my job about a year and a half before we were planning on me leaving. And it just got to a point where my time was better spent doing something else. I just felt like my days at work were wasted and that I was losing a lot of energy and creative space to do the thing that was bringing me the most joy.

Kiersten Saunders:
So I had started talking to Julien about potentially leaving early, probably six months before I actually built up the courage to do it. And in that process, he kept pushing it back to me like this is a you thing. You need to decide. And so I finally decided, and the first people I told were my parents, and they were just like, "Okay." And then when I told my friends, it was in the context of planning a brunch. They were asking for open dates because I had already trained them, everything had to be calendarized or I'd forget. And in that process I was like, "Oh, it doesn't matter because in three weeks I'm quitting my job and I'll have a ton of free time." No one had any questions. It was just like, "Okay, do we want a Southern brunch or a buffet?"

Kiersten Saunders:
And it was just like, "Oh." No one asked any questions about it. I didn't think that was odd at the time but in hindsight that's a really odd thing because if I said I was pregnant or if I was moving to another state, I feel like there would be more conversation. There would be more followup questions.

Bobbi Rebell:
By the way, and in the show what struck me is that you talked about if you were talking about the latest diet, they would have probed every little detail. And yet when you talked about this major life change, no one asked you how are you going to have income? What's going on? Tell us more about your business even, right?

Kiersten Saunders:
Yes, exactly. Yeah. I feel like there are certain milestones that we're conditioned to ask about and other ones that we're not, and anything that requires insight into money or finances or how the family is going to survive, I'm using air quotes, but those are the things that people are uncomfortable asking about probably because it feels invasive.

Bobbi Rebell:
What did it make you realize about yourself? Do you feel that you ask? If you were in the other position, looking back, do you ask friends? Do you feel comfortable asking them?

Kiersten Saunders:
That's a great question. I don't think I do. Conversationally I eventually get to be curious in other conversations, but if someone told me, "I quit my job," the first question isn't, "Well, how are you going to make money?" I might ask other questions like, "Oh, what happened?" or, "How did that feel?" I'm more concerned about their psychology then about where the money comes from, the finance part of it.

Bobbi Rebell:
I want to circle back to this in just a few minutes, but I want to get Julien's story. So you were a little bit ahead of the curve from your wife in terms of leaving your corporate life. Tell us about that experience. Was it similar to Kiersten's?

Julien Saunders:
No, actually. I made the decision to quit about 24 hours before I did. I'd been leading the charge. My wife had our first son in 2017 and literally a few weeks after that we launched the blog. It was a project that I just felt really passionate about and we were both doing it, but obviously she was a bit occupied with a newborn, and so it was just something that I launched because I thought that it was important, but slowly but surely it built up, it was gaining legs and I started to learn more about how it could turn into a business. And as I started to really envision what I thought the possibilities were that was bucking up against a time at my job where things were just getting really, really difficult. We had rental properties, the market was doing well, our portfolio was doing well, our business was doing well.

Julien Saunders:
And we had so much wind in ourselves. I really just realized that, you know what, I don't need this. It was really, really stressful. There was just bad times we were going through who knows what version of another type of transformation or reorganization. And so the combination of work stress, dealing with a newborn, I just said, you know what, it's time. If we're going to make a bet on anything, let's make a bet on ourselves. And I'm really, really glad we did that. But to Kiersten's point, when I decided to quit, no one asked any questions. It was like, "Okay." And I presume they just thought that I'd land on my feet, which I think is a fair assessment, but I don't think at the time anyone really understood. In fact, I don't even think I really understood that we'd be working on Rich and Regular full time. We were still... Had one foot in and one foot out. But I think it really speaks to just how taboo talking about money is.

Bobbi Rebell:
Now you're both in this business full time. What kind of conversations, if any, do you have with your friends and family? Do they ask, "How do you guys make money?"

Julien Saunders:
Yes, they do ask those questions, which I think means it's working. What we're doing is forcing people to really look at alternatives and to look inward with respect to how money impacts their lives. And yeah, they're all asking those things and they're blown away when we share the endless list of ways in which you can earn money on the internet. So through us, they are learning about that, and hopefully for those who are able and interested, they might even consider exploring this as a path for themselves.

Bobbi Rebell:
One thing that stands out that you guys talk about a lot is the idea of coded language when it comes to money. Can you explain what that is and how it applies to what you guys have gone through in transitioning from corporate jobs to having your own business that a lot of people are curious about, but maybe are hesitant to ask the questions. People use this whole different choice of words.

Julien Saunders:
It's funny because we even catch ourselves doing it every now and then, but I don't know that it's that different from what people do in relationships. And so you use just enough language to make the conversation not seem awkward, but you're not really saying anything. You didn't answer the question, you didn't give the person what they were looking for and you didn't even explore in really what you potentially could have in order to get to the root of the conversation. But yeah, I think there was a moment in the episode where we were talking about how much money you make, and now that I think about it, it almost seems like an SNL skit. But these are very real conversations. It's like, "Well, I'm doing okay." And that doesn't mean... You don't ask how much money you make, but you signal when you say I'm doing okay or we make good money or what was the last one, the upper level?

Kiersten Saunders:
Can't complain.

Julien Saunders:
I can't complain. I can't complain. Things are going well. There's all these things. Same thing in work culture, you get on the elevator with your friends and you ask how they're doing and they say, "Living the dream," and what they really mean is-

Kiersten Saunders:
I'm here.

Julien Saunders:
"I'm here. I'm surviving. I would love to be anywhere but here right now," but they know they can't say that. And so they signal by using this really fluffy language and as funny as it is, I think the problem is, we don't learn that way. We don't really understand how we feel or even respect how other people feel when we continue to use that language. And so we're hoping to inspire better conversations about money by exhibiting it.

Bobbi Rebell:
One of the things that I think is an interesting theme that you bring up is the balance between being transparent to help each other and help your friends and family by being a little more detailed that you joke about six figures can mean really anything, generally good, but it could mean so many different things, but also respecting that there are privacy, there are boundaries that you need to respect as well. So how do you balance that? Especially these conversations about when people probe about your business. In a way it seems like Kiersten you wanted them to ask you more, but yet maybe not too much more, right? How do people navigate that?

Kiersten Saunders:
Yeah. It's one of those things that you have to test and learn, try and see what happens because the answer is going to depend on the relationship that you have with someone and the trust that you've built in that connection, whether or not your boundaries are going to be violated or respected, depends on what you've set the tone with before the money conversation, which is why we stress that money conversations are rarely about money.

Kiersten Saunders:
If you don't have a foundation of trust and respect and love in some circumstances you could end up being hurt by that conversation. It could be something that prevents you from talking about money going forward. So it is this awkward dance that doesn't really have a straight answer, which is why we love video so much because you can see the brow furrow or the frown show up, or the smile disappear or the laugh, there are these nonverbal signals that tell you I'm okay with this conversation, even though to Julien's point, people don't have the words to say, "Yes, let's keep talking." You have to look for the invitation in other ways.

“What we are doing is forcing people to really look at alternatives and to look inward with respect to how money impacts their lives.”

Julien + Kiersten’s Money Lesson

Kiersten Saunders:
I want to say that the lesson without sounding flippant is that people really don't care. Your job, that's not the part of you that they care about. What you do for a living or how you make your money is not the part that people obsess over the way that you may think that they do. It's more around, do you feel confident in your decision? Do you feel good about it? And if that's the case, then I don't have any followup questions for you. And I don't feel the need to pry.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that. Julien?

Julien Saunders:
I, in a very rare moment, I agree with my wife. 100%.

Kiersten Saunders:
Is this recorded?

Julien Saunders:
Yeah. No, I agree. I was nodding my head and saying, "Yeah, I think you're right." Because as I was flipping through several instances, I think she's absolutely right. Most people really don't care. In fact, what they're talking about are the good old days, right? Not your future. They're not worried about your future because they trust you. They love you. They want what's best for you. And they're going to support you however they can. But to her point, we tend to overcomplicate those things because we assign so much value to these other things. And we just make these situations muddier than they need to be. And we're not perfect. We trip over our own words and say hurtful things to each other probably more than necessary or usual, but we're human beings.

Julien Saunders:
And we hope that that shows through in the web series and really any other form of communication that we put out there. And so it's really just to encourage people to say, "Hey, don't be so afraid to make yourself vulnerable." I feel like I'm channeling Renee Brown right now, but it's true. Don't be so afraid to make yourself vulnerable, be honest because really, really beautiful things come out of making yourself vulnerable.

“What you do for a living or how you make your money is not the part that people obsess over the way that you may think that they do.”

Julien + Kiersten’s Money Tip

Kiersten Saunders:
So my everyday money tip is to focus on elevating or leveling up the things that you touch every single day. So for us that is the towels, the sheets, the coffee, the silverware, the things that I touch every single day or interact with every single day, when I really, really enjoy them it's like a little surprise that just extends its way through the day versus it being concentrated in something that I might touch every so often. And so for us, I just upgraded all of our towels and bedding and I enjoy every shower. I enjoy going to sleep every night and waking up and interacting with those things all the time.

Bobbi Rebell:
And Julien noticed right away.

Julien Saunders:
Absolutely. I slept like a baby last night.

Bobbi Rebell:
And the towels.

Julien Saunders:
Yes. I was dryer quicker. I don't know.

Bobbi Rebell:
You know what, we're going to leave it there because I want people to go to your YouTube channel and hear because there's actually a lot more to the story about especially the sheets, but especially the towels. There's a lot of details you guys need to hear about the towels. So we'll leave a link for sure in the show notes to your YouTube channel so people can get the full details.

“Money conversations are rarely about money. It is this awkward dance that doesn’t really have an answer.”

Bobbi’s Financial Grownup Tips:

Financial Grownup Tip #1:

Ask if you can ask. If you have a friend or a loved one having economic trouble or success, let them know that while you don't want to pry, you'd love to hear more details if they feel comfortable or as much as they feel comfortable sharing. You might be surprised at how much they appreciate your interest.

Financial Grownup Tip #2:

A follow up to the Saunders' tip about upgrading your stuff that you use every day and how great that is. Don't forget that when you do that, don't hold onto the old stuff. My family and I have been cleaning out and we realized, for example, that I have two sheets as back from what we use now, just sitting under the bed in a container.


Episode Links:

Follow Julien + Kiersten!

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Family + Relationships, Entrepreneurs, Financial Grownup, Money, Personal Finance, Role ModelsBobbi Rebell KaufmanRich and Regular, Rich & Regular, Julien Saunders, Kiersten Saunders, Julien and Kiersten