Meaning Over Money

We love your questions!  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton answers some of the questions recently asked by you, the listeners.  Here's a rundown of what you'll find: 1) How to deal with judgmental peers and family who criticize our financial and career choices. 2) Should we pursue advanced degrees? 3) Is buying a house always a good financial decision? 4) What's the differenc...

Budgeting is typically viewed as something necessary for people who are doing somewhere between “bad” and “ok”. In today’s episode, host Travis Shelton explains why budgeting is important for everyone, but even more important for people who make good money. A good income + intentional budgeting = game over! People don’t know what they don’t know, so we are going to provide some real-life examples...

It can be really hard to prioritize our financial goals in life.  This is true for everyone, but especially so for young adults.  After all, young adults are experiencing many significant life changes......and life is moving fast!  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton discusses the 10 things we can do to help us successfully prioritize the right goals for YOU.  You may not nail all 10 of th...

Hot Take: We don't think you should do your own taxes.  We think it's one of the biggest financial mistakes most people make.  We know, we know...this is a controversial perspective.  But we hope you'll at least hear us out before rejecting this notion.  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton explains why it's a typically a mistake when we decide to do our own taxes.  He expla...

We live in a culture that tells us to seek security, comfort, and steady.  We couldn't disagree more!  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton discusses why saying "yes" to doing weird things can change everything.  He explains the potential benefits of doing weird things, shares a handful of personal examples, and shines the light on others around him who are living out this ide...

As a follow-up to Episode 10 ("What About Crypto?"), host Travis Shelton discusses why the creators of Robinhood are geniuses, what makes it different than other platforms and other points in history, and some of the inherent risks of the platform.  We also provide an update on Travis's young client who invested $6,000 into crypto a few months ago.  Lastly, Travis shares about his ow...

One of the most important pieces to winning with money, as well as having a healthy marriage, is getting on the same page as your spouse.  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton discusses why it's so important to be on the same page and how to get your spouse onboard if they aren't already.  Not married yet?  We also talk about how to think about this money stuff when you're open...

In order for us to make financial progress and maintain healthy relationships, we need to start treating ALL income as equal.  In this episode, host Travis Shelton explains why treating all income as equal (i.e. important!) is so important for our progress and our marriage.  This is one of the most overlooked topics in personal finance, so we are going to shine a light on a better way!  After all,...

More and more, especially with the prevalence of social media, there's a narrative in our culture that everyone should aspire to be their own boss.  "Stop building someone else's dream and start building your own."  "You can't become wealthy working for someone else."  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton discusses what he thinks about this narrative.  You ca...

Whenever we decide to take a career path that's counter-cultural, criticism is surely near.  The crappy part is it often comes from those who we love and trust the most.  Making tough decisions is hard enough by itself, never mind adding hurtful comments, doubt, and criticism by people we expected would support us.  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton shares some of his own experience...

Travis is coming in hot in this episode! Money is NEVER about money. It’s always about something bigger. We continually say it’s not about becoming rich, but rather “living a life of meaning.” What does that even mean? In today’s episode, host Travis Shelton defines what it means to him. These are guiding principles for our business and our own families’s lives. We deeply believe in these principl...

We find ourselves in this strange reality where everyone is a stock picking “expert”......or so it seems. In this episode, host Travis Shelton attempts to shine a light on the real truth about picking stocks. Are people really this good, or would they be just as good (or better) by picking stocks at random? Let’s find out! This episode includes an appearance by Meaning Over Money co-founder Cole N...

When we think about debt and the role it plays in our life, we tend to boil it down to dollars and cents.  Interest rates, monthly payments, debt-to-equity ratios.  Truth is, debt costs us far more than a handful of dollars.  For some of us, it costs us our dreams.  For others, our freedom.  For many more, the things that truly matter to us.  We're willfully selling our livelihoods for things...

We live in a culture that says more money = more happiness.  Today, host Travis Shelton dives into the psychology of money and why it never makes us as happy as we think it will.  We also explore some of the things that DO make us happy, according to behavioral scientists.  You'll probably be surprised.....but not surprised at all.  Everywhere we look, we find more evidence pointing to meaning...

In our previous episode, we made the argument for why the stock market has very little risk.  The natural next question we receive is, "what about crypto?"  In this episode, host Travis Shelton shares his perspective about crypto and the three questions each of us need to ask ourselves if we're thinking about taking the crypto plunge.  You'll quickly hear, and we'll affirm on...

On one hand, it's cool to see how many people are interested in investing these days.  The shadow side to this awareness and interest is a handful of very dangerous, very toxic, very pervasive, and very skewed perspectives of what it means to invest.  One of the biggest questions we get is "how risky is the stock market?"  Some people perceive it as a game and engage it with reckless...

In today's special episode, host Travis Shelton answers some of the questions we've received since launching the podcast.  Here's a rundown of the topics:   1) A newly married young couple is moving to an expensive city.  How should they go about finding an affordable place to live?   2) A newly engaged couple is thinking about moving in together to save on living expenses.  Is this th...

We live in a culture that says giving is good, saving is wise, and spending is irresponsible.  We couldn't disagree more!  Yes giving and saving are important (so important!).....but spending is just as important!  In this episode, host Travis Shelton explains why he believes our culture has a toxic perspective on spending, some of the resulting consequences, and how spending can/should add va...

We live in a culture that's obsessed with being comfortable.  Stable jobs, big houses, nice cars.  Did we mention stable jobs?  In this episode, host Travis Shelton discusses why he thinks we as a culture have it backwards, how he battled comfort in his own life, and what the alternative looks like.   Travis mentioned a few things in the episode.  If you're interested, here's where you...

Impulsiveness gets a bad rap in our culture.  It's treated as irresponsible, hurtful, and negligent.  In today's episode, host Travis Shelton discusses why he thinks impulsiveness is awesome.....if done right.  He explains the difference between reckless impulsiveness and planned impulsiveness, as well as the 6 things we must do if we want to create planned impulsiveness in our own life. P...

In this week's episode, host Travis Shelton explains why we spend so much time and energy focusing on young adults.  In short, young adults are awesome!  But there are a lot of reasons why we spend so much time and energy on young adults.  If you're a young adult, we think this episode will be quite affirming.  If you're older, we hope you will get some valuable takeaways from these ob...

It's a very unpopular opinion, but we're not fans of FIRE Movement!  In this episode, host Travis Shelton explains what FIRE is, and why we have the controversial stance of disliking it so much.  Unlike other opponents of this popular strategy, our opposition isn't related to the math.  It's not about money......it's NEVER about money.  Whether you're an avid FIRE follower,...

We all have biases.  Experiences, perspectives, and knowledge that alter what we see when we look through the lens of life.  In this episode, host Travis Shelton shares a piece of his story so you can know where he's coming from.  He shares about how he made a lot of "normal" decisions, how they came back to bite him, how he and his wife paid off $236,000 of debt in 4.5 years, how li...

Welcome to the inaugural episode of Meaning Over Money!  Thanks for stopping by.  In this episode, host Travis Shelton talks about how Meaning Over Money came to be, why it's different than other personal finance content, and shares what you can expect in future episodes.  Here's one thing we want you to know:  money is NEVER about money.  It's always about something deeper.  So yeah,...