Podcast Episode - Best Of: Trust Your Gut

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While Suze is recovering from her surgery, Sarah and Robert present a "Best Of" episode from March 3, 2019. They read some well wishes from the Women & Money Community and give some insight.

Podcast Transcript:

Suze O. here. Now, listen to me, everybody. While I am healing, Sarah and Robert are going to present the following "Best Of" episode of the Women and Money podcast, as well as the men smart enough to listen, and briefly explain why they chose it for you to hear. So, hopefully, we'll be providing updates on the app as to what's happening with me. But until then, just know that you all need to stay safe, you all need to stay strong, you all need to stay secure. And by the way, I'm going to take my own advice here and I'm going to do the same. So, everybody, enjoy the "Best Of" podcast. See you soon. This is Sarah, and this is Robert, and today is Sunday, July 26, 2020. And we're from Suze's Women and Money podcasting community team, bringing you the best of the best Women and Money podcasts while Suze's off recovering. We wanted to thank everybody right at the top of this podcast for sending all the messages and prayers and blessings through the community to Suze and KT, they certainly have loved hearing from everybody. Robert and I are going to read a couple of those messages in just a minute. But as you know, we wanted to give you a quick update before we shared any of those messages on her surgery from July 23, this past Thursday, just a couple days ago. It went very well. As you know, it was a long day. We posted an update in the community, but she is now on the road to recovery. So, what we need from everybody listening is to keep sending these prayers and messages, they are working. Robert, I think it's about time for me to read one of them. I know you picked one out as well. I did. I found a good one. So, let me go first to Jenny P, she's a member of the community. And just so you know, if you're wondering what we're talking about in the community, you can go to the Apple App Store or Google Play and download the community for free just by searching Suze Orman. OK, so the first message I wanted to share with you that I loved so much was from Jenny P. She says, sending so much love and blessings to you and KT. Please listen to your nurse, KT, so you can hurry back to us, Suze, you're a treasure to us all. And I love that because that's exactly right. We need you, Suze, to be listening to KT right now. Oh, I love that one. All right, this one I found on the community, this is from Judy CP, and she says, yes, Suze, you're a strong woman, and will recover from this. Stay the course. KT, take care of yourself too as Suze will need your support to get back on her feet. Praying for both of you. I love that she says "stay the course" because I know you're going to preview the episode in just a minute, and strangely, there is something about staying the course in the episode. OK, here's another one I found, and I'm pretty sure it's from somebody very, very important to Suze, who she knows back from her days at the Buttercup Bakery. And for all of you that know Suze's back story about being a waitress before she was a stockbroker, you will have heard this name. This message comes from Woody and Paula and it says, we are so relieved that your surgery was successful and that you will soon be back podcasting, helping others, and, of course, fishing with KT. Thank you for so courageously sharing this experience with us. For the decades of friendship we bear witness, you always walk your talk. You inspire us. Here's to more healthy, wonderful years together. We love you. Oh, that's so great. I love that one. So maybe one time we pick an episode where Suze talks about the Buttercup? Oh, absolutely, we've got the origin story in the pipeline. Fantastic. All right, I guess it's that time to cue up our first "Best Of," Robert. So, we chose an episosde that was originally published on March 3, 2019, entitled Trust Your Gut. And in light of what is going on with Suze, we thought this was a great one to start with. That's exactly right. On Thursday, she shared with us her own personal story, her health story, standing in her truth. She called it Suze Tells Us Everything, and remember, she said to us she knew something was off. So in this episode, we get a great story from when Suze was a stockbroker 40 years ago, back in 1980. And we're going to hear how when we listen to everyone and everything, including a crystal, instead of trusting our gut, that really messes us up. And, we get reinforcement on two of the five laws of money. And, it is the first time in the podcast we hear the parable about keeping both of your feet in the same boat. That's actually my favorite part of the episode, I'm so glad she told us that one, and she went down the path of being on the water and on a boat. My ears perked up because, you know, I'm a skipper too. OK, everybody, here we go, this is Suze on trusting your gut. You know, every day before I go to do something, I usually say prayers. But I say them when somebody is either doing my hair, or doing my makeup, or I'm on the way to an event, or whatever it may be. Very seldom, in fact, I can't even remember the last time before today, when I did those prayers sitting down by myself, not doing anything else but those prayers. And today, I sat down to do my podcast, and I did my prayers. But this time when I did my prayers, you know I pray that everything that I say is something that really helps you. I also pray for only those who will benefit from my products that I create, my books whatever it may be, buy them. So, I'm having a joint prayer for you as well as for me. And I sat today before this microphone, and rather than just doing them to get them over so that everything could be OK, I took my time. I closed my eyes, I concentrated, and I only did my prayers. Nothing else. I didn't wish for an outcome. I just did that for five minutes. And as I was doing them, I felt totally centered, like I felt this energy enter me that even enhanced how intense I normally am. Even though I probably sound more calm right now. But from there I realized that it is within all of us. It is within you. If you just got in touch with what you wanted to do, not what somebody else wants you to do, not doing something in all the business of life just to get it done. But if you sat down for just five minutes to ask yourself, or to pray, or to do whatever. What is it that you want in your life? How do you want to deal with your money? How do you want to deal with every decision that you have to make? Do you want it to be one that enhances you and it makes you feel stronger, just like I did a little bit ago? Or do you want to just do something to just get it done and move on? Now, what does this have to do with money? It has a lot to do with money because here's the point of today's podcast. You have got to learn to trust yourself more than you trust others. Every single one of us always asks others what to do, what to do, what do you think? What should I do? And you really listen to others' advice. When it comes to your money, you can listen to what other people say, but you have to trust your gut. Many emails that are coming in are saying to me things such as, Suze, I've saved $500,000, I've saved $10,000. Whatever it is that you've saved. You go to a financial advisor and they tell you to do something, and you don't feel good about what they're telling you to do. Some of you go ahead and you do it, and then you write to me and go, oh my God, I can't believe I put all of my money into this annuity. And why did I do that within my retirement account? I just heard your podcast and I realized I may have just made a big mistake and blah, blah, blah, blah. It's essential that you listen, but you trust your gut because undoubtedly in these emails it also says to me, but Suze, when I was doing it, I didn't feel right about it. I didn't know what to do, so I just listened and I just did it. Trust your gut more than you trust others. It was 1980 and I had first gotten a job, as many of you know, at that time as a stockbroker for Merrill Lynch. Having been a waitress for seven years at the Buttercup Bakery in Berkeley California, making $400 a month. So here I am, almost 30 years of age. No training, nothing. My world has been serving a platter of food, not a platter of financial advice. I am so afraid because I don't belong there. I don't know what to do, I don't know who to believe. And I would go, every Tuesday would be a sales meeting, and it would be this sales meeting where many people would present ideas that all the brokers in that room, starting the next morning, should go out and sell to all their clients. And I would listen to some of these ideas and many of them didn't make any sense to me. But then again, what would I know? I was just a waitress prior to being a financial advisor. You know, I'm really not your typical financial advisor. If I could tell you the stories of what went on at Merrill Lynch, at Prudential Bache, at all these places with me. You would laugh. Like, I'll just tell you a quick story here. So here I am, a vice president of investments for Prudential Bache. I've now moved on from Merrill Lynch. I know I'm skipping all over the place today. And all the offices have these big wooden desks, they were all for men because again, even in 1983, three years after I was an advisor with Merrill Lynch, I was still the only woman who had come into Prudential Bache at that time. Are you kidding me? But anyway, I didn't want an office that was all wooden desks, and this and that. And that was so male, it wasn't even funny. So, I had money then. So, one weekend, I brought in all this furniture that I had made for my office, that was cool, it looked great. In fact, it was like black lacquer with the silver trim, and I brought in curtains, and beautiful chairs to sit on, and I put all of the furniture that was in my office in the manager's office. In his exact office and said, deal with it. Anyway, I don't know why I thought I should tell you that story, but all right, I did. But what's important is that here I am, a broker for Merrill Lynch, and I don't know who to trust. And as I was starting to say, and I say it at the beginning of every podcast. This is not your ordinary podcast because there's nothing about me that's ordinary. I somehow remember California. That's where I was. I somehow start taking this crystal. I got a little tiny crystal that was maybe an inch long, and I tied it to a string, and I decided at that point in time that before I bought a stock for a client I would ask my crystal. And if it's, just stick with me here all right everybody, and if it swung clockwise, I would know that I should buy it. And if it swung counterclockwise, I should know I should not buy it. OK. All right. Now, I learned that by the way from an acupuncturist that I was seeing that would hold a little crystal over your chakras and all that, and again, as I said, it was California. So, I would go into these meetings and when I would come out I would ask my little crystal. And sometimes it would sing swing clockwise and sometimes it would not. But I never ever bought a stock that didn't. And the other brokers would see me do this and they would go, you are crazier than we had any idea. Until months later, when my stocks that were being chosen by my crystal were all going up, and the ones that I chose not to buy were all going down. Little by little, one broker would come to me, and they'd sit down and he'd say Suze, can you ask your crystal if I should buy XYZ stock? And I would go, no, you made fun of my crystal, I'm not asking my crystal anything for you. As time went on, and I had winners, and I had avoided losers. I started to realize that I was the crystal. I did not need this little device to tell me what to do. All I had to do was trust my gut, to learn, what did I think? What did I feel? What was my gut telling me? And that probably is the most important lesson I have learned in my life, and I want you to learn that as well. One of the emails I got was from a woman who has saved $500k in her IRA. She has another $800k that whatever it is, she's paid off her house, she's been listening to me for years. She's done everything that I've told her to do. And she now goes, years later, because she's been with me for a long time, goes to see a financial advisor that tells her if she continues to invest the way that she is investing, she's going to outlive her money. And now she gets afraid. Now she writes to me and says Suze, I'm told I'm investing like an 80-year-old. Are you kidding me? If she has amassed the amount of money that she has amassed, knowing that her husband who is a policeman, is going to absolutely get a pension and everything else, then they are going to be more than fine. Why should she change her ways? It has been working for her. I doubt highly she may even need to touch any of this extra money, given the pensions that she's going to get. But yet, she is totally confused now. She's not trusting her gut. She's not doing what she has been doing all these years, which is investing her money in a way that makes her feel secure. And I go back, again, to what is the goal of money? The goal of money is for you to be secure. You are not to do anything an advisor tells you if your gut tells you that you don't want to do it. This is your money. How many times do I have to say, what happens to your money, directly affects the quality of your life. Not my life, not your financial advisor’s life, not your insurance agent’s life, but your life. And your life has to be one where you know your thoughts, you know your fears, you know what makes you feel good, you know all of that about yourself, and how do you do that? Oh, here we come back to the beginning of today's podcast. Do you just take five minutes and sit with yourself? See what it feels like to sit and just close your eyes, and you will find that the thoughts in your mind are going rampant. Try to still your mind, try to not think. Good luck. Good luck. We are so busy, we are so busy all the time, thinking, doing, feeling, wanting, needing. We don't even know who we are on most levels. We can't even sit quietly. When you are confused, it is better to do nothing than something you do not understand. Everything can be made to sound really great. People can make numbers work any way they want to. But all that matters, is you know, if you understand something, you know how it feels in your gut. Two things from today's podcast: Try really hard to stay in touch with how you feel about something. If it doesn't feel good to you, and I'm not just talking about money here, I am talking about every aspect of your life. If it doesn't feel good, don't do it. So write this down. You need to trust your gut more than others. That's just one law of money. The second law of money, you have got to understand, it is better to do nothing than something you do not understand. Do you get it? Do not pretend like you know what somebody is talking about. Do not pretend that, oh, I get this so I'm just going to do it. If you can't understand the investment that somebody is asking you to do, and if your gut also tells you not to do it, don't do it. Both those things have to be true all the time. Even if your gut says to do it, but you don't understand it, don't do it. If your gut says not to do it, but you do understand it, still don't do it. Both those things have to be going on. And here's the image to keep in your mind. And again, right that second one down. It is better to do nothing than something you do not understand. But here's the image to get this. You have one foot in one boat, you have another foot in another boat. When they start to spread apart and go in different directions, what happens to you? You fall in. But if you have both feet in one boat, then you always go in the direction you need to go. Hopefully, you will not fall in, as long as you're also the captain of that boat. You steer that boat where you want it to go. And if both feet are in that boat, you will get there. So again, one foot. Trust your gut more than you trust others. Trust yourself more than you trust others. One foot in a boat. It's better to do nothing than something you don't understand. Another foot, that foot goes in the boat and you, you, are the captain of that boat. Be a strong captain. Be a smart captain, and therefore, you will become a secure captain. Well, there you go, that was our very first "Best of the Best" episode. We hope you enjoyed what you just heard and learned something. And remember, you can share your well wishes, prayers, thoughts, and blessings for Suze and KT right in the app. You can find it on the Apple App Store or Google Play, you search Suze Orman and you'll find it right there. One more thing, if you have a suggestion for us of an episode that you love, you should share it with us in the community because Robert and I are taking requests. So thank you so much for listening and we'll see you back here on Thursday.

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