My Father Never Taught Me This About Money

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My father's a great man. He raised me, he was present, he was there. But there are five things about money he never taught me. And it's not because he didn't love me, it's because he didn't know himself. Today I'm telling you what they were, and what I'm doing different for my son and my daughter, so the cycle stopped. Let's be honest. What did your father actually teach you about money? Not what you wanted him to teach you or what you wish he taught you. What did he actually teach you? If that answer is nothing or wrong things, this video is for you. Most working dads were raised by good men, great men, but they knew nothing about money. Not because they were lazy, not because they were stupid, it's just because no one taught them. They went out, got good jobs to support their families, support their kids. They brought home the bacon. They paid the bills. Maybe took you on a vacation, Great America, Disneyland, things like that. But they didn't teach you how to say. When you asked for something, you got it. When you wanted the new Jordans or whatever, you got it. But you never really knew how the money was coming in, where it was going out. You never knew what was going on. That's the cycle that we have to stop. We have to teach our children about money. I'm of the belief the two most important things in this world is God and money. A lot of people say money isn't everything, but let me tell you something. To everything that is important to you, you need money to do it. So I'm about to tell you the five things that my father never taught me about money that I had to wait years and years to learn. Because there's bought knowledge and taught knowledge. I had to buy it. I had to buy it the hard way. $18,000 in debt. That's how much I paid for. So teach your kids these five things that I wasn't taught, and maybe you weren't taught either. And let's stop the cycle right now. Check out these five things, right? Number one, my father never taught me how to invest because he didn't know how to. He used to, like I said in other videos, he would reach in his pocket, pull out hundred dollar bills. Hell, I thought that's what money was. I thought he had just endless amounts of money. He didn't have small bills. All he had was big deal. But he never invested that money. That money never worked for him as hard as he worked for it. So there was no compound interest. There were no assets. There was no legacy. You have to teach your kids how to invest. And nowadays it's a lot easier than it was for him, for your dad, for my dad. Investing for the minority community really didn't start until the 90s. Because before then, there was a lot of gatekeepers. I can remember the first time when I worked at a bank and I asked the bank manager, who also, I guess he was like a broker for the bank, how to invest. I went into his office, you know, the other ladies were saying, Yeah, you know, he's a you know, he's a big stockbroker. He knows how to invest. Go ask him. So I go in there and I ask him. I asked him, I said, Yeah, I want to know about, you know, investing in the stock market. He looked at me, he was like, Do you have any like money saved or anything like that? Like he didn't even really look at me. He kind of looked out the corner of his eye and he was like, Yeah, you know, when you get some money saved up, you know, you could come back. I'm being nice. He was an asshole. He didn't want to tell me how to invest. He figured I didn't have any money. This little black kitty doesn't have any money. I can't make any money off of him because that's how they make money off of your money. So he didn't want to show me. If that happened to me in the mid or early 2000s, what do you think happened to other men in the 80s, the 60s, the 70s? They weren't allowed to invest, so it's not their fault. But don't let that stop you. You can start investing for your son, he can start investing for himself, and that's the number one thing my father didn't teach. Number two, he never taught me how to budget. But I saw this great video that shows how it's done.

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And check it out right here. My dad sat me down when I was in the seventh grade and he put all the bills on the table. And he says, Okay, son, let me teach you what it is like to be a man, to be a man in the household. It's just not about being bigger than everybody in the household, it's about taking care of these finances. Right. He put all the bills on the table, he put his check on the table, and I was in the seventh grade, so of course I could add and subtract. He said, This is simple math. Add up all the bills, take my he got paid every week. He said, take my four checks, add those up. And he said, now, subtract the bills from the total of what my checks are. And whatever's left over, then we're gonna talk about how much we pay on groceries. Right. And then we'll get down to what's left over. Right? And he said, That's the money. He said, That's the way you do a budget. That's what I learned about budgeting in the seventh grade.

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Right there. That's how you do it. He said, his father sat him down, he got paid every week, he showed him how much his checks were, he showed them, you know, the rent, the mortgage, the light, you know, the water. Now you got internet, everything. And after everything is subtracted, that you have to pay. What's left over is what I can do for you, your mom, your sister, and maybe me. So when you want to add people something a $250 switch, it's gotta come out of this. So once he's 16 years old and he gets a job, he'll understand how to budget. He'll understand. And I say he said the seventh grade, I'm saying third, fourth, fifth grade, you should be teaching your kids that exact method. Number three, he never taught me how to defend my purchases. He never taught me this one line. Why shouldn't I be stopped from buying this? That's the question. Every man, every young man, every boy should learn. Like I said before in a video before, you got that autopilot switch. When you see something you want and you know you just got paid and you got money, you go out and buy it. I know a guy who used to do that all the time, he would just go out and buy stuff and then he will return it. No. You need to be able to do that before you buy it and say, I don't need that. The way you defend your purchases is knowing, okay, is this thing gonna pay me back that I'm buying? Is it gonna pay me back the money? Am I gonna be able to make money from buying this? Number two, is it for my family's security? Does it is it something my family has to have? Does it help my family run more smoothly? And number three, it's something you've been saving. You've been saving for this thing. You've been saving month after month, week after week. Okay, go out and buy it. That's how you defend your purchases. Number four, he never taught me about calculating risk. And I wish to God he would have taught me about this. My father was a businessman, entrepreneur, was successful, but he never taught me about calculating risk. He never taught me to do away with the line, the notion, the phrase, it takes money to make money. No, it takes profits to make money. Risking your hard-earned money on something that's not churning a profit is one of the biggest risks you can make. It's one of the biggest risks, and it's the one of the quickest ways to get yourself in debt. Teach your son, teach your daughter how to calculate risk. And teach your son or daughter how to walk away from things that aren't making money. Even if they this is their labor of love, this is their first business they ever started it. If it's not making any money, walk away from that shit like it's a girl with bad breath. I'm really glad we ran into each other today. Oh, wait, I totally forgot. I left my stove on. Gotta go. Bye. They've got to understand that if a if an idea or if a business venture or if an investment isn't working, the idea of just putting more money into it isn't going to help it work. It's not like the stock market. That's maybe the one thing in life that you can, whether it's up or down, you put money into. He never taught me or emphasized hard enough that money is a tool. What is money? That's the question that you need to know first before you can tell your kids anything. Money isn't just an exchange of value. Back in the day, people used to barter. Now I just give you money for what I want or what you can do for me. And that's what you have to understand. It's a tool. It's a tool to use to get the things, the things you want, but most importantly, to have the things you need. Here's the lesson that I learned from making this video and just coming up with it all and just thinking about what my 89-year-old father didn't teach me about money. Is number one, the first thing you do, teach your son how to invest before his first job. He should be investing right now. Teach your sons how to budget before they get their first paycheck. Show him this video. Show him the video that I referenced in this video about budgeting. Do it yourself. Sit down with your son and your daughter and show, okay, this is what daddy got paid. This is what daddy has to pay, or you and your wife both do it. And if you haven't done it with each other, start there first. Teach them the defend your purchase question right now. Teach them that. I got a 10-year-old and I got a six-year-old. I'm gonna teach them that question right now. I'm gonna teach them why shouldn't I be stopped from buying this? If it doesn't fall under the three categories that pass, everything else failed. The fourth thing, the lesson that I learned is there's a difference between risk, calculated risk, and hope. I started a t-shirt business, I started a hat business, I started a lot of things I've done, and you know what? It was based on hope. Nobody really wanted those things. I started the business anyway. It's a calculated risk when you say, okay, there's a there's a market for that. People want that. People are asking for that. I just have to create the product. You're just starting some business that nobody wants or doing something that you want to do and you don't know, and people say, Oh, that's a good idea. Is it? It's a good idea if there's a market for it. Other than that, you're just hoping somebody will buy it. You cannot survive on hope. The fifth lesson is money is a tool. This is the big one. Carter's gonna see me using money as a tool. I'm not chasing after it, I'm not stressing over it, making it my whole world, fighting over it, making the whole family depressed about it. Make your dollars work. Just don't earn them. My dad was great at earning them, he didn't make them work for him. See, that's what that's where we gotta switch it up at. Your father, my father, they did their best. So honor him, respect him. But by doing that, make sure we don't repeat the same things and the same mistakes that they made. Any good man wouldn't want his son to repeat the same mistakes that he did. I don't, and I'm sure you don't either. Here's the challenge for you this week. Two lists. One list, five things my father never taught me about money. It's not about shaming him, it's just about being clear. What didn't he teach you? The second list is five things I'm gonna teach my son about money. That list is the blueprint, that list is your legacy. And what's on that list is what your son is gonna inherit. Or he's gonna inherit the first list that you did. The cycle doesn't break by accident, it stops because one man in the family decides that he's tired of running the same old broken playbook and starts to write a new one. Subscribe every Sunday. I'm dropping a new video and Wednesday and shorts throughout the week because this channel is for working dads who might be having issues with money, discipline, manhood for your son, and you can even apply a lot of this for your daughter too. So if this hits you, like I said, drop a comment, let me know what your father didn't teach you, and I'll see you on the next one.