Money mentor Rose Han went from $100K in debt to self-made millionaire—and today she breaks down the inner and outer shifts that made it possible. We dig into money identity, practical systems (budgets that don’t feel punishing), and habits that expand wealth consciousness without burnout.
In this episode:
- Why your money identity quietly dictates your results—and how to rewrite it
- Rose’s “rock bottom to millionaire” turning point (and the shame she had to release)
- Budgeting that aligns with values (so it actually sticks)
- Monthly Money Dates: how to track net worth and stay motivated
- High-yield savings, emergency funds, and paying off high-interest debt
- Staying calm in volatile markets & making decisions you can live with
- NLP + belief work to close the gap between where you are and where you’re going
Featured Guest:
Rose Han
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Transcript:
Megan & Dr. Alex 0:00
Megan, you’re listening to the becoming zesty podcast. We are Megan and Dr Alex, and we’re so happy that you’re here. We are passionate about accelerated transformation, yours, ours and the collective, personal and professional for coaches, practitioners and leaders of all kinds. Between the two of us, we seem to have done things the painful way, so let our pitfalls become your stepping stones. We are not afraid to share our raw and vulnerable truths in order to help you transform your thinking, your body, your heart and your soul, combining over 15 years of functional medicine with brain based habit change to lead you to create the life of your dreams, supporting yourself through all four bodies, physical, mental, emotional and energetic every step of the way we Are transformation, accelerators, wholeness, cultivators, empowerment, experts, speakers, authors, mentors and change makers for a more loving world. By combining Dr Alex’s MD experiences with Megan mindset magic, we’ve helped hundreds of 1000s of people transform their lives, and we can help you too if you’re ready to accelerate your transformation and have so much fun doing it. Then stick around. We’ve got you covered. Quick reminder, this information is not meant to diagnose, manage or treat disease. Always consult with your doctor, not this doctor, before making changes. Now let’s get into today’s episode.
Megan Blacksmith 1:42
Hi, everybody. Welcome to the podcast. Megan here, and I also have an amazing guest, Rose Hahn with me. Welcome Rose.
Rose Han 1:51
Hi, thanks for having me on.
Megan Blacksmith 1:53
Oh, I’m so excited for this conversation. We got to meet at a little mini mastermind with James Wedmore. So this is really cool full circle from last year to have you on here and share all your amazing wisdom with our listeners.
Rose Han 2:08
So I’m excited about this. Yeah, same. I really remember connecting with you, and it was, it was around the time I was just starting to finish my manuscript, and there are a lot of things going on. So yeah, it’s good to come catch up with you again like this.
Megan Blacksmith 2:23
Yes. And I know that the people who listen to this podcast care about money, and we want them to care about money. So you have an amazing book come out, coming out, coming out. Let’s see, depending on when this airs, it’ll be out. It should be out. Yes, okay, so let me just share a little background. Rose is an internationally renowned money expert, educator, traveler and book nerd. I love that. On a mission to show others how to create financial freedom. On her widely, wildly popular YouTube channel, she’s shared her entire financial journey of going from $100,000 in debt to becoming a self made millionaire. Rose has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Business Insider and CNBC, and has helped millions of people pay off debt, start investing and building wealth. Okay, cool, so tell me, Rose, how did you even start like, what inspired you on the money journey, or money interest in really learning and coming into this world?
Rose Han 3:29
Yeah. So ever since a young age, I have always been very ambitious. I really wanted to make my parents proud. You know, when you’re a daughter of immigrants, that’s kind of what you want to do. I studied hard, I took piano lessons, I got into the best college. I was always ready to do whatever it took, and after doing all these right things, after college, I found myself $100,000 in debt at the age of 23 and I had this big job, but I was living paycheck to paycheck, and I felt like such a failure, because when you when you feel like you’ve done everything, yet somehow your life sucks, your freedom, the freedom that you’ve always dreamed that you’d have is not there.
Rose Han 4:10
I actually really internalized that and thought something was wrong with me, but what I realized is actually we were just I was just given the wrong playbook. I wasn’t following this the correct formula to success, and that’s that’s when I realized that I had to look for a solution that wasn’t that I wasn’t taught. And that’s when I embarked on this search in books. I realized I didn’t learn this from my parents and I didn’t get it in school, but I know that something out there is possible for me, that I just need to find an answer. So I just, I started looking reading books and looking for mentors, and that’s when I realized that, oh, it’s just information that I didn’t learn. And if I just learned this information and follow different actions, I can get there.
Megan Blacksmith 4:58
That’s so cool. So you really just. Learned book by book. That was the start of it all
Rose Han 5:04
Well. So that’s the informational side of things. But what I really want to share with your listeners is, there’s a lot of information information out there, but what it really started with, for me was, and was, was, was more of a inner mindset shift. So as I shared I had done all the right things, and I felt like such a failure, and I was actually internalizing a lot of shame. That’s the part I really want to share, because I really think before any financial transformation can happen, especially around money, there’s so many emotional blocks there. And I think shame is one emotion that a lot of people feel around. It like having screwed up, they’re not where they should be. Other people are further along than they are and and there was a moment where I was flying back on from a trip. It was burning man, I don’t know if you’ve heard of Burning Man, it’s a really cool festival, and there’s something about being taken out of your regular environment and that makes you just like reflect on life. And I was journaling on the plane, and all of a sudden I had this flashback to a memory that I had blocked out. And it was a flashback of several years ago. I was in my sophomore year of college, sitting at a kitchen table with my dad, and we were discussing like finances and how I would pay for the next semester of college. And he was like, you know, you we don’t have money, but, and I was stressing out, because after one year of college, I was already like, $30,000 in debt.
Rose Han 6:32
And I was like, oh my god, what am I going to do? And he was like, Don’t worry, Rose, you know, I’ll like, co sign your loans. You can just borrow money for school. And it sounds like such a simple moment, but in that moment, I realized, oh, like, I’m in debt, because that’s what my parents knew, that’s what they advised me to do. You can only do as good as you were taught, you know. And something about that moment just provided so much relief. I remember bawling on the plane, like journaling by myself in the little corner in my seat, and that’s when I realized, oh, it’s not my fault. Like I felt like such a failure, and that actually was stopping me from taking action. You know, I mentioned I read books and I started doing all these things, but that all came afterwards. It started with that moment of self acceptance and realizing, okay, it’s not my fault. There’s nothing wrong with me. I was just doing what I was shown, which is what my parents knew. So I can only do as good as what I’ve been shown. And okay, so now that there’s nothing wrong with me, I can actually, I had some room to look at the situation and see, okay, it’s not it’s not me. Like I can actually have some space to do something about it. So that’s really where it all started. It really started with that inner, inner shift.
Megan Blacksmith 7:50
I love the plane ride realization,
Rose Han 7:53
Yeah
Megan Blacksmith 7:54
It’s the best space for it,
Rose Han 7:57
Yeah.
Megan Blacksmith 7:57
So what made you think or realize what was the missing areas that you were like, I need to actually write a book, because you have this amazing book, add a zero out. So what inspired you to think that there’s, there’s more that I need to share?
Rose Han 8:15
Yeah, so the book I, as I mentioned before, when I started searching for answers, after that moment, I spent pretty much every Saturday my free days in the Barnes and Noble. And at the time, I was living in New York, so there’s a big Barnes and Noble in Union Square, and every Saturday I would go in there and just wander to the Self Help section and look for answers like I figured, I’m not learning this stuff from my parents or in school. But I know that there’s more for me out there, if I, if I just knew the way, so I would read all these books and, like, act on it. You know, that’s when I started budgeting and getting myself out of debt, like doing actually looking at my money. That’s also where it started, and and, and transforming my finances by taking action. But it all came from books. Like I was always just so fascinated by the fact that you could learn anything you want in a book from like, the greats, you know, like they’re just sitting with you, and you can feel them through the pages of the book. And I was in my early 20s at the time, so I thought one day it would be so amazing to pay it forward and write a book. And the thing about these, there’s amazing books, like Four Hour Work Week, Rich Dad, Poor Dad. You know, I stand on the shoulders of giants, but also I felt, I feel like I really had to piece together a lot of different bits of information. And it also often came from people that I couldn’t relate to, like older men, or they were already at a certain level, so they couldn’t talk to me. Like, talk to me. I’m like, living paycheck to paycheck, and I feel embarrassed to look at my finances. Like, talk to me from from that level, you know. So I thought, okay, one day I want to write a book that’s really, really relatable for some.
Rose Han 10:00
Who’s just like me, who started out where I am, and shows them the entire process, not just like all of a sudden, how to invest and make a ton of money, but when you’re starting from rock bottom, like 100,000 in debt, and you are so scared to even look at your numbers, to go from that to the full transformation, I feel like there’s a lot of phases and steps along the way, and different levels of or different different mindset shifts you have to make at each stage. So I want, I really wanted to put everything together in one book, like all in one place. So it’s wild that it happened. I mean, I thought it would take a lot longer for me to, I guess, be qualified to write a book, but I realized, you know what, I’ve done it, and I want to show people how to do it, too.
Megan Blacksmith 10:46
And so you write about changing your money identity. And I love that we do a lot of identity work. So to change your financial reality, can you explain what that means to you? And I love that you’re talking about kind of the different phases people go through. So why is the identity work so powerful?
Rose Han 11:03
Yeah, one thing I realized is that we always act in alignment with our identity and with money. I’m sure a lot of people can relate to this. We tend to have very self sabotaging patterns around money, like we always, we always tend to do the same things, or your finances sort of revert back to a certain level, like maybe you make a bunch of money, but then you revert back to whatever sort of fixed set point you have in your bank account, which is maybe, maybe a couple $1,000 for me at the time when I started my journey, I Always had about one to $2,000 in my checking account. I never had more than that, because first of all, my bi weekly paycheck was up to $2,000 so I never had more than that, and I was living paycheck to paycheck, and if I did get a bonus or something, I would spend it all. So that was my set point, and also my debt set point was just $100,000 it didn’t move for many, many years, and it wasn’t until I realized that I had this identity, that debt is just part of who I am. I’ll always be in debt. That was my identity, and it came from the fact that, you know, my parents were always in debt, and that debt was sort of the solution for everything that we needed in our life, and it wasn’t until I recognized that, and then it started with that moment, the journaling moment on the plane, that I realized, oh, this has been my identity. But it doesn’t have to be like when you can look at your situation from a little bit of distance, you realize these stories that we’ve internalized about ourselves are just stories that we’ve told, but they’re not who we are. Like it’s a story, and that means you can tell a different story. So it starts with with recognizing. So I have a process for rewriting your money identity, and it starts with recognition. So I recommend Burning Man. I recommend long plane rides, journaling. So any, any sort of reflective solo time you can have to really think through, look back at your life and try to identify patterns, key emotional moments that imprinted how you act with money. Those are, those are good things to do, so recognize and then release, that the release stuff is more of an emotional process, and like when I cried on the plane, like that was my release, it really is a step to of forgiving yourself, forgiving yourself for having that thing, and also consciously choosing, I’ll release this story. It’s okay. It doesn’t have to be me. And then the final step is to rewrite, because we are in charge of our destiny. We can, we can choose the stories that play out in our lives. So rewriting from debt is just my destiny to I can create the wealth that I want.
Rose Han 14:00
That’s one example. So, yeah, that’s basically where it all starts with a money identity shift.
Megan Blacksmith 14:09
What do you see as the common identities for people that they’re like, unconsciously operating from?
Rose Han 14:17
Yeah, a common one, I think, is debt. You know, I’ll always be in debt, or I’ll, I’ll always, I’ll always be broke. I’ll always be struggling with money.
Rose Han 14:29
Uh, some other common identities are, I’m not good with numbers.
Rose Han 14:36
And also something I like to say about there’s all so there’s money identity. And there’s also something else I want to point out, which is also just how you think about money itself.
Rose Han 14:46
So if you think that money is bad, like rich people are greedy, or having more money is going to change me in a bad way, that’s also that’s also something that you want to be conscious of, like you.
Rose Han 15:00
Want to you want to be conscious of how you look at money, how you look at yourself in relation to money, and how you also look at money itself. So really common. One that I want people to to look out for is how you judge money itself. Because if you judge something, you’re never going to have it subconscious, whether subconsciously or consciously.
Rose Han 15:20
Yeah, that’s for sure.
Megan Blacksmith 15:21
We so in, NLP, we talk about how, right, we have to get all of our senses on board, right? So the does it? Does it have a good smell? Does it have a good taste? Does it look good? Does it feel good? Do we say things to ourselves, and we’ve had people actually realize that they’re like, money is there’s a bad taste in my mouth? Or, like, money is dirty? Like, like, actually hard to call in something that you’re like, it’s germy, it’s dirty, it’s for evil people. There’s all these stories. So
Megan Blacksmith 15:49
I love that, I love that you brought that back around. It’s just such an important awareness of, how do we even think about it? Like, what are our stories about it?
Rose Han 15:58
Yeah, with NLP, it’s all about language, right? Language informs your thoughts, which informs your actions, so how you talk about money, and how you think about it in your mind, the the inner words that you use to to talk about money, it really inform how, how you treat it, and then that’ll inform how much money you end up having your have in your life? Yeah, yes. So let’s talk. I feel there’s the belief shift, which everyone listening here is all on board for, because we talk a lot about that. And I also want to talk about some practical like, what are you know in your book? What are you are you talking about practical steps that you’re recommending for somebody like, let’s talk about that person who’s in debt or believes they’re always be in debt.
Rose Han 16:49
Yeah, so it sounds really simple, but the first practical thing that everyone can do is just to look at your numbers.
Rose Han 16:58
Avoidance is very common, and once you do some of that inner work of you release some of the shame and shame and self judgment you have towards yourself, it becomes a little easier to face your numbers, because at the end of the day, those numbers aren’t saying anything about you, like that’s kind of what we’re afraid of, is what these numbers will say about us, that I suck, that I’m A loser. But once you realize numbers don’t mean anything, it only has the meaning that you give it. So numbers are just numbers. Can we just look at it like data, like get curious and see what the bank account it has to show us? So a really simple thing that everyone can do today is what I call a spending Deep Dive. So it starts with looking at your spending, gather the last three months of your bank statements, credit card statements everywhere, where you spend money, and take out two highlighters. One can be green, one is orange, two different colors, and go through your spending and see which of the spending felt really, really aligned, like you look at it and you’re like, it was a lot, but I really enjoyed that $200 dinner, catching up with my best friend and or, but then this, this, like $300 boots that I never wore again, that felt like a waste. So green, orange, green, orange. Green for it felt good. Orange for it felt bad. And that will already give you a lot of insight into what spending feels good for you and what doesn’t.
Rose Han 18:28
And so that’s the first practical step. And then from there, I also explain more in more depth in my book, like how to create a budget from that that feels good, that you’re actually excited to to keep. That’s the thing, like you need to also be excited to keep your budget. If it cuts out everything that you love to spend on that feels good for you, then you’re not going to do it. So it’s really about aligning with what feels good for you, and that that’s really starts with getting clear on your numbers first, what feels what what spending felt aligned and what didn’t. That’s already going to be a, a huge step, you know, because how many people do know,
Rose Han 19:05
like, have no idea what they spend, you know, I can’t remember the number of times I’ve heard my friends tell me, like, Oh, I just spend on my credit card, and I’m so scared to look at what’s going on there. So I have no idea what’s going on.
Megan Blacksmith 19:19
Yeah, lots of people,
Rose Han 19:21
yeah. And even, even me, like, even, even now some, there are some, some months where I’m like, I actually I’m kind of feeling myself being avoidant. And, yeah, so it’s always a journey. It’s not like, one day you’re going to be like, amazing and just be on top of it forever, for the rest of your life. It’s always a journey, you know. But I find that every time I veer and I don’t look at my spending and my numbers and at least check my budget. Once in a while, I actually start feeling really stressed out, you know? So at the end of the day, that’s really the shift that I want people to make, is, can you associate looking at your numbers and managing your finances with feeling good with.
Rose Han 20:00
If not feeling stress. Because at the end of the day, you feel like you might think, oh, swiping your card and not looking your numbers, that feels like yoloing. But at the end of the day, it’s not because you’re going to be stressed as fuck, you know. So I keep learning that every time I stray from my budget, then I’m like, Oh, my God, I’m so stressed I have no idea what’s going on with my money, and I want to buy this thing, but I don’t know if I can afford it, because, like, I don’t. I haven’t, like, allocated my money correctly. So then I’m like, okay, okay, let me just go back to budgeting. And ah, okay, now I know what, what’s happening with everything. And yay. This is why we do this.
Megan Blacksmith 20:36
How do you balance that? Rose, I feel like budgeting versus like manifesting or right there’s this abundance thinking versus this constricted feeling, because sometimes you’re saying that budgeting is making you feel more comfortable you’re like now, I feel good about it.
Rose Han 20:54
I hate budgeting.
Rose Han 20:56
What do you hate about budgeting? Specifically..
Megan Blacksmith 20:59
I don’t want out of it to be, I don’t want to have rules rose. I don’t want to have rules about what I can and can’t do. And I don’t want to track it I do, and I I really, yeah, I really don’t like tracking it to that level of like, when I feel constricted. I don’t want to feel constricted. I feel like that’s the underneath the budgeting,
Rose Han 21:25
like, that’s that’s where I really want to shift people’s attitude towards budgeting. And for a long time, I did not want to either. I really resisted it for a long time because I thought, well, if I have a budget and I want to do something, it’s going to look at me and tell me, No, you can’t do this because you need to do that instead. And more and more, I realize actually my budget has helped me say yes a lot, yes without yes to all the things, yes to taking care of my future, you know, saving, investing for the future, paying off debt, and also yes to getting a massage or going to festivals. That’s what I like to spend my money on.
Rose Han 22:06
Like, it’s a way to say yes to everything. Because, like, when you, when you, when you spend money, like you’re always saying no to something else. You know you’ve, we’ve heard of that saying, like, every yes is a no to something else. So yeah, when you go
Rose Han 22:22
on a shopping spree and you spend x amount of maybe $200
Rose Han 22:26
that $200 could have been a no to something that else that’s even more important to you that you haven’t considered because it wasn’t in front of you, like, in sort of a well thought out budget, like, maybe you actually also really want to take your aging parents to Italy while they’re still able to walk. You really want to do that in the next two or three years, but when you’re standing there in the store and you don’t have a budget to guide you, you don’t see all those life goals in front of you. So we’re like, Yeah, I’ll buy these $200 boots. Yay. YOLO, right. But later on, you then you end up not being able to take your parents to that dream vacation, once in a lifetime, vacation, so you’ve actually said no to yourself,
Rose Han 23:08
and having a budget is actually a way to say yes to both things, because maybe you do want those boots, but you also want that vacation with your parents. So looking at your budget, every month, you can allocate your money consciously and say, Okay, I’m gonna put $50 towards these boots, and I’ll have it in three months, because it’s actually not that important or urgent for me, but I really want to take my parents on vacation soon, in six months, so I’m gonna put 150 away towards that. And for the next six months, I’ll put 150 away, and then I’ll have, I don’t know, I didn’t do the math, but 1000 or so to to put towards that vacation, you know, so you can, it’s a way to say yes to everything that’s important to you, but doing it each each goal in its own time.
Rose Han 23:56
Yeah? Does that sort of make you a little more excited about
Megan Blacksmith 24:00
Yeah, I like that shift. I think, Okay, I’m realizing I’m, like, I have such interesting money, the way I use money, because I make really, really large investments easily, and I don’t like to spend like, $50 at Target.
Rose Han 24:18
You mean large investments, like that mastermind, yeah. Or, like, like, eight, I spent $18,000 on a one week training in Mexico.
Rose Han 24:27
That was a magic training.
Megan Blacksmith 24:28
Yes? And I literally will, like, cringe when my daughter wants, you know, like, $50 of face wash at Target. It’s so fascinating to me, but it’s my value of, like, like, what, what I’m interested in, what I want,
Rose Han 24:44
yeah, and what’s cool is everyone’s budgets is going to be so different. Like, I love looking at my friends budgets. Like, what do you spend money on? That’s so fascinating to me. Me, you look at my budget, you’ll see where all my money goes, obviously, to invest.
Rose Han 25:00
Its financial goals, because those are really important to me. I want to hit a I want to create a $10 million investment portfolio. That’s my next big goal. So as I allocate a lot towards that, but I also have other things that are important to me, like wellness. I love spoiling myself with massages and acupuncture and all those self care things, and also making memories with friends and family, going on trips, buying festival tickets and going VIP, so we’re comfortable that kind of thing. And then my third category, which is health, health. So like organic groceries. I want a fridge full of organic groceries.
Rose Han 25:38
So that’s the cool thing about your budget, like, there’s no right and wrong. You You’re you should allocate the most amount of money to those things that feel the best to you, and then the things that aren’t important, like face wash from Target, you know, try to have very little. Like, the more your budget actually reflects your values, the better it is. So there’s really no right and wrong. And I hope I can take that kind of judgment or a fear of budgeting away from people a little bit like it’ll help you become more of who you are.
Megan Blacksmith 26:12
I love that. So okay, what do you say to the person? Because we see this, there’ll be a set point. Maybe person has only ever made a certain amount of money, or their family of only ever, like, saved a certain amount amount of money, right? So, like you said, 10 million in my portfolio is the next. And so let’s say you, you’ve only ever been around people who have a million or 100,000 or something. How do you go about helping people expand that wealth consciousness? What are your thoughts on that?
Rose Han 26:43
Yeah, well, there’s like, a tactical thing that you can do, which is, so I’ll show the tactical thing, and then also the more personal development side of things. So the tactical thing is you also need to create, like a safe haven of money that’s always going to be yours, like, if you have money in your checking account, but it’s always going up and down, up and then down, then that’s that’s you’re not really gonna raise your set point over time. So you want to create some accounts that are not accessible easily, that are not your checking account. So a real one, really easy account everyone can open today is a high yield savings account. These are online only accounts. They pay much higher interest than regular bank accounts because they tend to have low overhead without having brick and mortar locations. So they pass on the savings to you in form of in the form of higher interest. So where, where like Chase and Wells Fargo maybe pays point 2% on your money. You can get like four, four and a half percent right now at a high yield savings account. So I want everyone to start in an emergency fund. That’s something everyone should start with. So so transfer at least $2,000 into your starter emergency fund into a high yield savings account that is a little bit out of reach from your regular everyday spending, and you have to train yourself to think this money is not to be spent. It’s it’s not there like
Rose Han 28:15
it’s locked away. It’s my permanent wealth, and for a lot of people, even saving $2,000 is and having that as permanent wealth as not something that you dip into when something else comes up, that’s already a pretty big step for a lot of people. You know, the average American wouldn’t even be able to cover a $1,000 emergency expense. So I always say, start with $2,000 because it’s like enough to cover most emergencies. The average emergency is around $1,400 car breaks down, pet needs to go to the vet. Like $1,400 is gonna cover most of that. So I say just round up to 2000 and put that in your high yield savings account. Never ever touch it. And that, for people who have never saved money before, that’s already gonna be a huge confidence boost, like, oh my god, I have $2,000
Rose Han 29:01
to my name that is never going anywhere. It sounds like really small, but it’s, it’s, it starts small. You have to build from there. And so after you’ve saved your $2,000 I also there’s some other steps that I want people to to follow. I have, I share, what I call is, is the financial waterfall. It’s like an order of steps, I can share a downloadable PDF for your listeners. Can attach it to the podcast, but yeah, it’s like there’s like a waterfall of ideal financial steps to for sort of fund, versus that $2,000 emergency fund. Then I want everyone to pay off their credit card debt, because interest on credit card debt 20 30% makes no sense to do anything else until you stop paying that kind of interest and so on and so forth. But, but, yeah, so that’s the tactical side of things. Start creating some permanent wealth. You know, open a high yield savings account, then there’s like your 401 K and Ira and investment accounts that are for you no matter what.
Rose Han 30:00
Even if next month, your friend invites you to this really cool Tulum girls trip, like money from there is not coming out.
Rose Han 30:09
So that’s the tactical side of things. And then on the other side is, if you have never grown up around people who have a lot of money or invest or live a different paradigm, then you’re gonna have to work a little bit harder to expose yourself to something else. But in this day and age, work with social media, and you can just DM people online, listen to their podcasts. That’s like a really great way to start. So for me, one thing I did at the beginning of my journey is I printed out photos of people that I admired, that were really successful, that I knew how to completely different money story than the one that I had. They had, they had something that I didn’t have. So Warren Buffett, I had Marie Forleo on there. I had a couple of investors that kind of niche names like Guy spear and a few other kind of famous people, Kim, Kim and Robert Kiyosaki. And I printed out their photos, and I like, paste, I taped them up on my wall in in front of my desk, where I could see them every day. And I would kind of just like, hang out with them and and also I was reading all their books, all their podcasts, consuming everything they put out so I could, like, soak in their way of being sort of just by hanging out with them. So that’s one way to do it, because the environment is very powerful who you surround yourself with. So being a little proactive about seeking out people who have better finances than you, it might feel like a stretch, like it might feel a little uncomfortable being around them, because you’ll have some stories of, oh, I’m not good enough, whatever, but it’s okay. It’s good to have that discomfort. You have to push through that because, because eventually, by osmosis, you soak their way of being and thinking and talking about money, and that’s what you really want. You want to like. You want to soak that in.
Megan Blacksmith 32:01
I know you had, there was a real recently, and you’d shared about, like, market crashing and recovering. And I’m just curious, what are your thoughts about, like, getting people to stay grounded and optimistic when the economy is like, the uncertainty.
Rose Han 32:18
Yeah, well, there’s nothing more emotional than investing your money and then watching it go down, and that actually is why most people don’t invest, even though we rationally know that we should, we shouldn’t sit on money, because inflation will eat away at the purchasing power of that money. We know all these things logically, but it’s so hard to actually do the thing because it means, oh my god, what if I lose my money? So the first thing I want to say is,
Rose Han 32:48
you can never control exactly how it’s going to play out, but there’s statistics that, like, the more knowledge you have, the less fear you’re going to have. So there are certain statistics that you can ground yourself in so that you understand how things really work. So the stock market, the US stock market, has never lost money over any 16 year period, all throughout history. So if you held your money for at least 16 years, no matter when you invested, even if you invested at the height of a bubble, before the Great Depression crash or the.com bubble burst, you know, even if you invested at the height of the market at those times, if you held for at least 16 years, you never lost money. So I, I find that very comforting, because it just tells you that if you just know how to play the game, then you’re going to be okay. So understanding the stats the other side of it is also knowing that in life, you can all. You can’t. You can’t control exactly what happens year by year, or what what happens to your money year by year, but you can focus on making the correct decisions.nYou have to focus on making correct decisions.
Rose Han 33:55
The correct decision is, is to you to put your money to work right like, I don’t think anyone will say, Oh yeah, the correct thing is to just keep it in a bank account or under your mattress and let inflation eat away at the purchasing power so that 30 years from now, you can only buy half of what you used to be able to afford. I don’t think anyone will say that’s the correct decision. So the correct decision is to invest your money another layer of that correct decision is to
Rose Han 34:23
to do it, to invest correctly with knowing how to succeed, which is stack time in your favor. That’s the one edge and guarantee that we all have, that the average person has we we can keep our money locked in for a long time, and we want it to grow as much as possible. The more time, the more time in the market, the more it compounds. So that’s what we want to do anyway. We want to keep our money in for as long as possible anyway. So as long as you don’t pull out, you haven’t lost money. You know, you don’t lose money until you actually sell. So just understanding the stats, the understanding how, how the game works.
Rose Han 35:00
Works like when it goes down, that’s normal. That’s also why markets have potential to go up so much because of uncertainty, uncertainty on the upside and uncertainty on the downside. So understanding that’s that’s the price of entry, to be able to hold through these types of really scary moments. That is the price of entry, to turn $500 a month into $1,000,000.30
Rose Han 35:21
years. You know, that’s pretty amazing. You don’t get that for free. The price of entry is to learn how to deal with the emotional volatility of it, which, if you understand, if you understand the stats, you can, you can look at it from a cooler, calmer perspective.
Megan Blacksmith 35:37
What’s been your biggest personal money breakthrough?
Rose Han 35:42
Personal money breakthrough. Well, I’ve I shared some of my personal money breakthroughs at the beginning of my journey. But now that I’m I’m realizing that it really is. It really is. It
Rose Han 35:57
really happens in phases. Actually, I remember James Wedmore, he keeps saying that about building businesses too, which is that growth happens in phases. And I think when you’re leveling up in your wealth, it also happens that way, like at one at one point in my life, my financial dream was just getting to zero, you know, just not having debt. And that felt like, Whoa. That would be incredible. Like, I don’t know how that’s gonna happen, but that would be incredible. And once you get there, then you have another vantage point. And then I thought, one day, you know, $100,000 net worth, that would be amazing. And then got there, and now it’s a million. And now I’m like, now I’m actually been pretty plateaued at
Rose Han 36:41
like, a seven figure net worth on the lower end of the seven like, not multiple seven figures. But now I’m like, how to get to 10 million? I I really feel the gap, like there’s a lot of confidence gap, uh, knowledge gap, just belief gap, to get to 10 million. So I know that I will. I just haven’t cracked the code yet. Other if I had, I would already be there. So, yeah, personal money breakthrough is just realizing that,
Rose Han 37:10
first of all, I’m very happy to be here. I’m not like, beating myself up that I haven’t figured it out yet. But the breakthrough is realizing it’s really all about what’s going on with me. I need
Rose Han 37:21
to work on myself before the money can materialize. So, so basically, I guess my answer is, I don’t have the breakthrough yet. I’m I’m working on it. You’re in it. Yeah, I’m in it. And I know, I know I’m in control. It’s just about believing that I can do it. But I think there’s, like, a little piece of belief that I haven’t really cracked yet. But yeah, I love this because it’s so helpful. Because then people are like, all right, even at your stage, there’s now, there’s another belief layer to crack, right? Makes us feel like, no matter what stage we’re at, everybody’s just kind of working to the next identity. Oh, yeah, I think what you create in your life is always going to be a direct result of how much you believe you can have or deserve, right? Don’t you think for sure? Yeah, absolutely. Do you have any NLP tricks you can share with me to help me through this right now?
Megan Blacksmith 38:18
I sure do. Rose, we could do. One of my favorite things to do, actually, is we attract people who, often they’re going from, they’re going from like six figures to seven figures in in business. I don’t mean what you’re talking about, building their wealth, but just like to bring in that that level. And it’s so fun to see how one small belief shift, because that’s for somebody who already has a structure, right, like they already have a business and a way to make money. So one small belief shift, it could just completely change their income, and now all of a sudden they’re like, Oh, that little thing I just didn’t even think to change, or the smallest tweak, or the or the mentor, or the next program, or the thing they’re willing to do, what they were blinded to it,
Megan Blacksmith 39:08
because right their unconscious is like, that’s not safe. I was just discussing money with my, one of my mentors this morning, and he believes I should be making way more money than I am based on my skill of he said, I’ve seen your training. You should have 100 people in there, not 20. And we were really talking about it. What could be that upper belief? And as we kept talking, I said, Oh, I actually believe I can make a ton of money. I don’t believe I will hold on to it. So there’s a there’s a I won’t maintain it. There’s this shift of like, Oh yeah, I’m gonna end up spending all of it. And I was like, Oh, I didn’t even really realize that was probably the thing stopping the next the next level of, well, will I will I be responsible if I have a larger audience or bigger trainings?
Rose Han 40:01
Oh, that’s so good,
Megan Blacksmith 40:01
Which is what you’re teaching?
Rose Han 40:03
Yeah, sounds like you have some money. Identity there of I’m not good with money, like I’m not gonna do good with a lot, which is fascinating, because I was, I’m a saver. My parents taught me to be a saver, and I worked in the corporate world, in engineering for 10 years, and I saved 11% of every paycheck, and I maxed out my Roth, and I did all the things early and young, which has been great, and it has served me. And now it’s like the Wild West. Since I’ve had my own business, it’s like the structure is gone, and I know I still have that ability. It’s just been very interesting. There’s something, something shifted with working for someone versus working for myself. It’s like, it’s not as orderly anymore,
Megan Blacksmith 40:51
Like there’s no rules, yeah, like there’s no rules. I can do whatever I want. My employer is not telling me they’re gonna match it. So there’s just, you know, and I know I can make good money when I want as well. So it’s part of the budgeting thing. Of I’m like, Well, if I want to go to an $18,000 training, I will just go sell something for $18,000 which is awesome and a great belief, and not as good for wealth building. So I know there’s something there to to keeping it, I keep a good amount, and I’m like, There’s something there. There’s, it’s just same as you you’re like, you gotta crack that code. There’s something there for me too,
Rose Han 41:34
yeah. Like, you have money come in, but it, but it comes out. Like you don’t really hold is that what you’re saying? You’re saying, you’re having trouble holding on to what you make. A lot of entrepreneurs actually have this issue. They’re very good at making it but not holding on to it right money. I was realizing recently that I would be better off making less and just actually saving, you know, a certain amount than than even going for the next level in business, because it’s like, that’s great, but that’s that doesn’t mean anything if then you hire five more team members, if it just in and out, it’s cool for your ego, I guess, to say the business brought in this amount, but it doesn’t really do anything if you personally, one aren’t getting it or saving it. Yeah? Yeah. Entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs, you know, we do a lot, but at the end of the day, it has to do something for us. So my, my book at a zero. It’s, it’s called add a zero, because I talk about adding a zero to your net worth, and I show you how to do it in phases. How to get to zero, first of all, then to 10,000 100,000, and and the the number to track is net worth. That really is the metric, if you were to just simplify and boil everything down, if you really want to know if you’re making progress financially. Is is your net worth moving up? It’s okay if it’s negative, but is it at least moving in the right direction towards a bigger positive number? So that’s something that I’d love everyone to start doing, especially entrepreneurs like we’re hiring and doing all these things. But at the end of the day, are you pulling enough profit out and then investing that money in on your personal side so that your family’s financial situation is measurably improving? So net worth is one great number to track.
Megan Blacksmith 43:24
So what do you suggest to the entrepreneur or the coach? Because we that’s a lot of people who are going to be listening here that are totally in charge of their own finances. And what would you say is the smallest step, just that they can do monthly, or a way of thinking to start that saving process if they’re not?
Rose Han 43:42
Yeah. So monthly. And we should all be doing this for our business too, which is looking at our business finances monthly.
Rose Han 43:50
So I’m not talking about your business. I’m hoping everyone has a process there. But on the personal side, I would love everyone to start doing what I call a monthly money date. And there is a checklist of things that you can do, first look at your net worth, which involves you going into your accounts, looking at the balance, your debt balance, how much is left, and putting on a chart, like, how much all of your assets, like, total them up, whether it’s 401, K bank account, savings accounts, brokerage accounts, and then on the liability side, all of your debts, like what you have left on your mortgage or your student loans, credit cards, unpaid bills, and then take the difference, and that’s your net worth. So every month I update that to see is it at least moving in the right direction, and sometimes it doesn’t. Maybe the market went down, so my investment value went down. It’s not my fault, but at least if it’s money that I’m adding to am I at least adding it to my net worth to either pay my debt down or add to my investments. So a monthly money date and every month, update your budget. Hopefully I haven’t scared you away from budgeting like That’s.
Rose Han 45:00
I always set my budget for the next month, and I change my budget like day by day, I’m moving money around different categories, but at least I know where every dollar is going and and when money comes in, I know where I’d like it to go, and then I can change that, but I at least have somewhat of a plan. You’re always going to do better if you have a little bit of a plan, and you change things than if you just fly by the seat of your pants. So, yeah, every month just create a sacred time for yourself, because your money is your money is your life, like you can’t do anything in this life without money. Um, money doesn’t buy happiness, but certainly makes it a lot easier when money’s not a problem, right to be happy. So I think your money deserves that time, like one hour a month. When you really get it down, you can just whiz through all of your numbers, update your net worth, update your budget in one hour a month. I think, I think your money deserves that, and carve that out in your calendar, like, set a meeting with yourself and
Rose Han 46:01
find a way to make it fun, like, have your favorite matcha while doing your money date and turn on a candle, or play some music and buy your favorite snacks. So you can just start associating money with, like, self care and fun and good stuff. Yeah, just carving out that time once a month is already going to make a big difference. Just like, look,
Megan Blacksmith 46:23
I love it. It’s a date, yeah.
Megan Blacksmith 46:26
Okay, Rose, you have a ton of amazing resources.
Megan Blacksmith 46:31
Your YouTube channel has lots and lots of, you know, lots of information there. And then your book, obviously. So tell people where to go. What’s the best place to kind of start, I’m assuming the book, but you tell us,
Rose Han 46:43
yeah, well, YouTube is where I hang out. I recently started doing more just more casual hangout videos where I just talk about choices that I’m making in life, the financial reasoning behind them, a lot of things. So that’s been fun, in addition to just how to make more money, how to save and invest it type of video. So YouTube is the best place I’m at. It’s rose Han on all socials, including YouTube. And also, if you want to check out my book, it’s called the website is add a zero.com Add a zero.com
Rose Han 47:14
and if you pre order or the book comes out September 2. So I don’t know when you’re publishing this episode, but you can order the book there, and if you order through that website, you can also get a couple of really cool bonuses I’ve created for you guys. So yeah, added zero.com and YouTube. Hope to see you guys around. Beautiful. Thank you so much for sharing. This was really fun. Yeah, it was good chat. Thank you so much for having me. Megan,
Megan & Dr. Alex 47:43
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