Ask Paula: “I Ran Out of Gas with 85 Cents in My Bank Account”

Afford Anything

Paula Pant | Cumulus Podcast Network

Entrepreneurship, Business, Investing

4.6 • 3.4K Ratings

🗓️ 3 September 2024

⏱️ 89 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

#537: Frequent contributor Joe Saul-Sehy shares an emotional, personal story of getting into a soul-crushing level of debt in his 20s and early 30s. He owed so much in back taxes to the IRS that he didn’t file a tax return for three years. He ran out of gas and was stranded on the side of the highway, with 85 cents remaining in his bank account. By the time he pulled himself out of debt, his twin son and daughter were seven years old. Learn the gripping, gut-wrenching story of Joe’s past money mistakes in today’s episode. For more information, visit the show notes at https://affordanything.com/episode537 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Joe, how old were you when you got out of consumer debt?
0:03.1	Oh my, whoa, I was three, maybe 34.
0:08.7	Hmm.
0:09.3	And how old were your twins at the time?
0:11.5	My twins were seven. Wow. How did that change the
0:16.0	trajectory of your life? Or did it? I guess I shouldn't assume. This is interesting
0:20.8	because getting out of debt didn't change my trajectory.
0:23.8	What changed my trajectory was the day when I realized I can't keep living like this.
0:27.7	When I realized that the laws of the universe applied to Joe Salcei High as much as they applied
0:31.3	to everybody else.
0:32.5	And instead of just dishing good advice
0:35.0	to everybody else and watching them get ahead,
0:37.3	that, you know what, the reason I wasn't getting ahead
0:39.4	was because, I thought it didn't apply to me. So it wasn't the day that you got out of debt,
0:45.0	it was the day that you started adopting the habits
0:48.0	and taking the actions that ultimately led to getting out of debt.
0:52.0	It is 100 out of debt.
0:52.6	It is 100% the day I made the decision.
0:56.6	Wow.
0:57.1	And it clicked in my head that this is going to go the way
1:01.2	I wanted to go, which is not the way that I'm going down now.
1:04.8	Geez, wow.
	...

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