Table of Contents
Deciding whether to have children is one of the most significant and personal choices a couple can make. In an era where dual-career couples are juggling career aspirations, financial goals, and personal fulfillment, the question of whether to embrace parenthood or a childfree lifestyle is more pertinent than ever.
For dual-career couples, understanding the implications of both choices is crucial to making a decision that aligns with their values, lifestyle, and future goals.
What is a Childfree Couple?
A childfree couple is defined as a couple who makes a deliberate choice not to have children. They are distinct from childless couples, who may want children but are unable to have them due to circumstances such as infertility.
For childfree couples, the decision is voluntary and often influenced by factors such as lifestyle preferences, career ambitions, financial considerations, or personal fulfillment outside of parenthood.
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Comparing Childfree and Childless Couples
The distinction between childfree and childless is more than semantic—it often reflects deeper differences in life satisfaction, emotional well-being, and societal perspectives.
Childless couples may experience feelings of loss or regret due to unfulfilled desires for parenthood, while childfree couples tend to embrace their choice and structure their lives accordingly. However, both groups can face societal pressure to conform to traditional family norms, leading to external stressors that can impact their overall happiness.
Are Childfree Couples Happier?
Several studies suggest that childfree couples report higher levels of happiness compared to parents, particularly in the context of dual-career couples. According to research, childfree individuals tend to experience less stress and more freedom to pursue their personal and professional goals.
While parenting can bring immense joy and a deep sense of purpose, it also introduces challenges such as time constraints, financial strain, and the emotional demands of raising children.
However, it’s important to note that happiness is subjective, and parenthood brings its own unique and profound sense of fulfillment. Couples who find joy in nurturing and guiding the next generation often report high levels of satisfaction despite the challenges.
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Do Childfree Couples Have a Higher Net Worth?
One of the most tangible differences between childfree couples and those with children is financial. Raising a child in the U.S. costs approximately $233,610 from birth to age 17, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
As a result, childfree couples generally have more disposable income, leading to higher savings rates, more investment opportunities, and greater financial freedom. Research shows that childfree couples tend to accumulate higher net worth over time compared to couples with children, primarily due to the lower costs associated with their lifestyle.
For dual-career couples, this financial advantage can translate into opportunities for career development, travel, early retirement, or other personal goals that may be harder to achieve while balancing the financial responsibilities of parenthood.
Other findings have concluded that childfree couples have on average a net worth that is only $2,000 greater than couples with children.
Related: Marriage. Is it worth it?
Considerations Before Deciding Whether to Have Children
Making the decision to have children or live a childfree life requires thoughtful deliberation. Here are some key factors couples should consider:
Financial Preparedness
Parenthood is a long-term financial commitment. Beyond the direct costs of raising a child, consider the potential impact on career progression, savings, and retirement plans.
Free Family Financial Planning Calculator
We have created a free family financial planning calculator to help couples make a financially informed decision. Click here to access the calculator.
Lifestyle and Career Goals
Do you envision your life being fulfilled through your career, travel, hobbies, or other personal pursuits? For dual-career couples, balancing work and family life can be a challenge, and it’s important to consider whether parenthood aligns with your long-term lifestyle goals.
Emotional Readiness
Parenthood requires emotional resilience and adaptability. Are both partners emotionally prepared to take on the responsibilities of raising a child, or does the thought of a childfree life feel more aligned with your values?
Support Systems
Raising children is easier with a strong support network. Do you have family, friends, or community resources that could help ease the burden of child-rearing, or would you feel isolated in the journey?
Relationship Strength
Having children can strain even the strongest relationships. Couples should have open, honest conversations about their desires, expectations, and how they will navigate the challenges that come with either choice.
Modern Husbands Podcast Episode
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® is the Founder and CEO of Childfree Wealth®, a life and financial planning firm dedicated to helping Childfree and Permanently Childless people. Childfree Wealth is the first life and financial planning firm dedicated to serving Childfree people.
Dr. Jay is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™, Childfree Wealth Specialist, and author of the book “Portraits of Childfree Wealth” and the upcoming book “The Childfree Guide to Life and Money.” Dr Jay is the co-host of the Childfree Wealth podcast. His Ph.D. is in Adult Learning from the University of Connecticut.
He has been featured in Fortune, Forbes, MarketWatch, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Business Insider, CNBC, and many other publications. In 2023, he was named a “Rising Star” by Financial Planning.
Winning ideas from experts to manage money and the home as a team. 2023 Plutus Award Finalist: Best Couples or Family Content
🔔 Click here to listen and subscribe to the Modern Husbands Podcast on Apple.
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Questions Answered
0:00:00 Introduction
0:01:41 What does it mean to live a childfree life?
0:02:49 Can you tell us the difference between childfree and childless couples?
0:03:45 Can you share a bit about your background and what inspired you to work with childfree couples?
0:08:15 What is the difference between the FIRE and the FILE movements?
0:12:00 What are the common misconceptions or different perceptions that people have about childfree couples?
0:21:50 The Gardener and the Rose
0:26:50 What advice do you have for couples on setting new personal and joint goals after their children have moved out?
0:31:22 What is one piece of simple and actionable advice for our listeners that you would like to conclude with today?
Additional Resources
Transcript
Brian (00:02)
Well, we are thrilled to have Dr. Jay Zigmont, often known as Dr. J. and his wife is Dr. Z. Is that right?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (00:13)
It is, otherwise I'd have to be Dr. Jay -Z, you know?
Dr. Bruce Ross (00:16)
Well that's your couple name right?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (00:20)
I guess so.
Brian (00:23)
Dr. J, thanks for joining us today. We're really excited to talk about what it means to have a child -free life, not just for folks who are living that life throughout the duration of their marriage, but also for folks who are perhaps going to be transitioning into becoming empty nesters in the next four or five years, who are eager for some tips. And my wife and I are actually one of those couples. So...
Let's start out with just you explaining what it means to live a child -free life.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (00:54)
Yeah, and from a definition standpoint, so when we say child free, we mean never having kids. So you and your wife won't qualify. So it changes your life and financial plan when kids are never part of the picture. You know, you have the empty nest pre -post, you know, those are different phases of your life. But overall, you're expected to kind of follow the standard life script. The standard life script says you go to school, you get married, you have kids, you know, you put in 25 years, retire, you know, kind of do that path where the child...
Brian (01:00)
Okay.
Dr. Bruce Ross (01:20)
There's those normative family stages, right? That people are supposed to go through.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (01:23)
Yeah, like in every book it's, you know, this is just what you do. You know, this is just what happens in life. And the interesting thing is about 25 % of the US are either child free by choice or childless not by choice and will never have kids. So when you're talking about 25 % of the US are going to follow a different path, it's really interesting when you find out, well, in finance and most, you know, educational, it's just not even talked about, like it doesn't exist.
So that's where I come in.
Dr. Bruce Ross (01:56)
And so I hear you use the term childless. So can you tell us the difference between child free and childless couples?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (02:04)
Yeah, so part of this is everybody gets to pick their own term. You know, so my wife and I, we don't have kids, whether it's by choice or not, you know, she had a 50 50 chance of dying if she got pregnant. That kind of like made our choice for us. So do we officially go into childless population or child free? We use child free. Often people use the term childless when it's not by choice, whether it's medical issues or situation or life or whatever else it is. It's a different path and
Brian (02:16)
Mm -hmm.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (02:33)
What happens is the child free by choice folks tend to put a thought through it and said, hey, no, I don't want kids. We're childless. Sometimes it's a grieving process of like the life you thought you were going to live and you're going to end up on a different path. And there's just two different paths that then converge at some point.
Dr. Bruce Ross (02:52)
Thanks for sharing that. Can we actually, I guess maybe even back up a little bit then and share a bit of your background and what inspired you to work with child free couples or childless.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (03:05)
Yeah, well, yeah, we use the term child free more than anything else. But when I was starting to become a certified financial planner, the interesting thing is there was never once a mention of the concept being child free. You know, it's pre post kids, like it just exists, but there's nothing. And, you know, it set me on this path. So my wife and I are both PhDs and we're researchers by nature. And I kind of wanted to research this. And the question I started asking was how weird are we?
Like, you know, we're weird. I mean, like two PhDs sit around dinner and we'll talk about like research studies at dinner. Like, you know, like we're weird, but like how weird.
Dr. Bruce Ross (03:37)
I mean, I did that yesterday. I sat around the dinner table and talked about the research papers I'm writing.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (03:45)
Right, and Brian's like, what? Like literally my wife, my wife and I started this morning, she's like, hey, I'm doing this analysis in STATA instead of R, and I'm like, that's just breakfast. You know, like we're having a discussion, but how weird are we for being child -free and living a different life? And when I started on this, I could hear the advisor, my dissertation chair was always saying, hey, if there's a hole in the research, maybe it's there for a reason.
Brian (03:47)
I'm one of the guys who gets to read them though.
Dr. Bruce Ross (03:49)
You
Hehehehe
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (04:13)
You know, like just because it's a hole does not mean you should research it. And I was wondering this question of like, is there a hole for a reason? You know, like is child free finance is just overlooked for a reason? I still haven't figured that out, but I started doing research on it, interviewing people and surveys and all that fun stuff. I wrote my first book on that. And what I found was I actually found there's a subreddit of our child free and reddits got its own issues, but about 1 .5 million people were in it.
So I'm like, well, yeah, yeah, I'm like, well, we're not like a small, and I didn't know the word child free existed. You know, like, it's like, it's not a small group. So I started finding out, well, we're probably actually not that weird within the subset of child free folks. You know, it's kind of always that question of what's your comparison group. And what I found was child free people live a different life and they have different financial concerns and they have different structures.
Brian (04:43)
Yeah.
Dr. Bruce Ross (04:44)
That's a big subreddit then.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (05:11)
And it's not better or worse. It's just different. I think as you dive deeper into it, you find out, you know, like all of our software assumes you're going to have kids. All of our software has assumptions in there of life cycle. All of our systems, like everything has this. And then it's like, well, you know, I'm kind of like feel some days like I'm swimming upstream and fighting a battle. But how do we make sure that that 25 percent gets good advice that fits them? And that's where
you know, kind of child free wealth and all my work comes from.
Dr. Bruce Ross (05:45)
Yeah. And as you say it, and I know we've talked before, but it all makes sense. And going back and like looking at my like textbooks and stuff that I use in our personal finance class or financial counseling and planning classes, they're all based off of that. You're going to have a family and going through this kind of normative financial plan.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (06:10)
So I'm gonna call you out on this. You just said something that's exactly my point. You said, well, you're going to have a family. My wife and I have a family, it just doesn't involve kids. But like there's like these assumptions, these words, these like things that are just all written in there that we don't even think about.
Dr. Bruce Ross (06:21)
Very important.
Right, because you're only quote unquote a couple until you have kids and then you transition into a family. It's part of that, maybe that normative stance. I feel like there's a perception of that.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (06:38)
Well, in...
Yeah, I think it's a perception. I think if you look at it in the business world, the Society for Human Resource Management looked at what it's like to be child -free at work, and they found that child -free folks are disadvantaged when it comes to taking time off from work. Well, you don't have a family, so you don't need Christmas off. No, I have a family. I still need Christmas off. I just don't have kids. You know, they're expected to cover extra hours because you don't have Johnny's soccer game, whatever it is. But like all of these assumptions that are built in there.
Dr. Bruce Ross (07:03)
Hmm.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (07:12)
And it's just interesting because when you pull it apart, you know, you'll get like the American dream. That's the two and a half kids, the house, the white picket fence. We're saying, no, we're going to live a completely different dream. And we're not saying it's better or worse. It's just different.
Dr. Bruce Ross (07:29)
I know in your you've written about before the difference between fire and file movements and I know there's there's also big subreddits and stuff about the fire movement so maybe you could explain a little bit of what that is but then what is this file movement as well
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (07:48)
Yeah, so FIRE is Financial Independence Retire Early, very popular right now. And one of the things you're finding in the FIRE community is the people that actually do retire early, it becomes kind of almost like the dog that caught the car. They're kind of like, now what do I do with the second half of my life? You know, like it's kind of like, got to my goal and, and what we're finding for
Dr. Bruce Ross (08:03)
It's good.
or the next two thirds of your life if you retire super early, right?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (08:13)
Yeah, it's kind of like what's next that, you know, for child free folks, what we're finding is that they don't really have retirement as a goal. So this concept of file finishers live early is more what they embrace, where if fires an on -off switch for work, files more of a dimmer switch. It's the right amount of work at the right time, the right level. And I'm going to pick on the academics in the room for a reason here. You look at a lot of academics, they get tenure.
and then they die in their office at age 85 and they never...
Dr. Bruce Ross (08:43)
Well, it's not a bad place to die.
Brian (08:45)
Wait, hold on, this is so apropos because this is a -
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (08:50)
I mean, but like, retirement's not necessarily the goal. Like, let's cut back on work, let's, okay, let's start phoning it in. I mean, but like, you know, like, I can make fun of academia. I spent enough time there, but like, you know, the file.
Brian (08:53)
Ha ha ha
Dr. Bruce Ross (09:02)
Go on.
Brian (09:03)
Well, you're this is that you're saying this is this timing is serendipitous because Dr. Ross was just 10 tenured last week. So he's already wearing it looks like a Hawaiian shirt and shorts showed up seven minutes.
Dr. Bruce Ross (09:11)
Yes.
I got my UK shirt.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (09:20)
He'll start phoning it in soon, you know, like we'll start seeing him less and less in the office now that, you know, it doesn't matter. But like, this is the file lifestyle. Like let me do what I enjoy. Let me cut back, not make retirement a goal. And by the way, most child free folks aren't focused on passing money to the next generation. So if I don't care about how much money I'm gonna pass on and I don't wanna retire, it changes just about everything in the financial plan. And what we focus on with people is saying, okay,
Brian (09:24)
You
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (09:48)
How do we figure out what you truly enjoy and do more of that? I call Marie Kondo in your life, get rid of things that don't bring you joy and do things more you do. The tenure is a great example of this. A lot of people when they get tenure, then they're like, you know, I don't want to work on that committee anymore that I hated, you know, because I don't have to. It's like, it's those choices that you get to make. And, you know, we have, you know, I have a podcast and I want to top download episodes. I'll make you quit your job because like, if you hate your job, why are you doing it?
If you're like, well, to save for retirement. Well, retirement's not the goal. Why are you doing it? You know, like, it just, it starts all of these things.
Dr. Bruce Ross (10:21)
Yeah.
It's very interesting and it's something that it started to kind of change the way I think about like, yeah, like I see professors, they are in their late seventies, even mid eighties still, you know, working and some of them are doing phenomenal jobs still. Some of them are, as you said, phoning it in. So, but is that...
what you want your life to look like. And so thinking about what my life really should be is an interesting or important decision really to make. Going back kind of with this child -free lifestyle and planning, what are some of the common misconceptions? Some of the different perceptions that people do have
about child -free couples, especially if we're thinking about retirement, where we're thinking about our financial plans.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (11:28)
Yeah, so the first one that's usually where people start is they assume just because you're child free or rich, like kind of like, you know, you don't have kids. So like the check comes flying through the mail and all of a sudden you have all this money left over. The absolute truth is income disparities exist both in child free people, parents and everybody else. You know, if you actually look at the national stats on net worth, the census looked at childless adults. They found that single childless adults had the highest net worth, single childless women in particular, but it was by like only like two grand higher than the next group, which was
fathers. So it wasn't enough to actually make a difference. Yeah, like it, it well, and that's, that's it, right? Like people are gonna have this assumption, like, well, you got all this money. Well, if you're not trying to pass off money to next generation, there becomes a point in a child free person's life where you can actually earn too much money, where every dollar you are earning goes towards your estate, which is not a priority. Well, if that's the case,
Dr. Bruce Ross (12:02)
Only two grand, that's...
Brian (12:04)
surprises me.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (12:27)
Net worth kind of going up and to the right is not a goal. So I'm not surprised that child free people's net worth is not higher. And I think there's also this expectation like, you don't have kids. So you need to like be this top career person or whatever. You know, like this is the old school. Like the old school was, are you going to have kids or are you going to be a career woman? That was the old school structure. You know, like you've got to do one or the other. No, you can just enjoy your life. You know, I have.
Dr. Bruce Ross (12:50)
Mm -hmm.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (12:55)
an amazing amount of clients that are like librarians or authors. They don't make a lot of money, but they enjoy it. You know, like there's a balancing act. And I think that there's just these assumptions that come across. And I think some of that's because some people are struggling and you know, there's some real issues in this country, but being child free doesn't magically fix that. You know, we looked at why people choose to be child free and finance is a high reason. About 30 % of folks cited that.
But it's more like, hey, if I had a kid I would drown. It's not like, if I don't have a kid, I'm going to be rich. The way we say it is living a life of child free wealth means you have time, money, and freedom to do what you enjoy. It does not mean you're rich. So you might have more time to do what you want, or you have more flexibility, or other things. So you make different life choices. It's not one of those things like, I got to stay in this house because of the school systems.
You know, things like buying a house are a choice for a child -free person, not a requirement. In actuality, with most of my clients, I tell them to rent. Because they're not going to stay there long enough for the house to make sense. You know, it's like the basic assumptions get turned on their head and you have to look at everything through it. The end result for us is for our clients, we try to plan for your life first, then your finances, then your taxes. You know, we don't let the finances drive decision -making. We say, what do you want to do?
What do you want to be when you grow up? I ask all my clients that I don't care if they're 70 or whatever it is like, what do you want your life to look like? And then let's optimize for that, which is just a different way of thinking about it.
Dr. Bruce Ross (14:35)
So that is very different than the traditional financial planning process. Can you say those steps again? What do you focus on first, second, third?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (14:46)
Yep, so it's life then finances then taxes. And the way we like to make it all come together, we say it this way. Let's make your finances simple so your life can be amazing. Yeah, we're looking at like, how do we make things so easy on the financial side that you can focus on the life side and really let the life drive it? And I'll give you an example of this. Being a landlord, so you're gonna own property, you're gonna rent it out, does not make your finances more simple. It just doesn't. Like there's paperwork, there's taxes, there's all like, and I've never had...
Brian (15:13)
Mm -hmm.
Dr. Bruce Ross (15:13)
Yeah, problem tenants, there's all kinds of things, yeah.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (15:16)
Yeah, there's a whole bunch of issues. And I've never had a client tell me that being a landlord made their life more amazing. It just doesn't. It's not like, yay, I get to be a landlord. It doesn't. So if that's the case, owning rental property is not something you should do. Unless you tell me like, hey, I love fixing up properties. I love doing this. It's part of the life.
Brian (15:29)
Ha ha ha ha.
Dr. Bruce Ross (15:30)
You
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (15:43)
No, let's not do it. Let's figure out what life you want to live. You know, when it comes to careers, do you move up the ladder? Well, if I move up the ladder, make more money. Awesome. Does it make your life more amazing? No. Anyone that's ever moved up the ladder knows the further you get up, the more stressed, the more miserable you get. Well, you're now making a choice of do I want more of amazing life or civil finances? What I find is as you start pulling back the curtain and kind of asking questions of why they're doing what they're doing,
Dr. Bruce Ross (16:00)
Mm -hmm.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (16:13)
You find out people are like, I just, cause that's what I'm supposed to do. Like I'm supposed to go up the ladder. I'm supposed to do this in my career. I'm supposed to, you know, we'll pick on academics again. If you don't go on the tenure track, you don't go through the path. You don't go up the ladder. You know, now you're associate. You have to be full professor. Like, like if you exit the standard script, people are like, what are you doing? And the answer is I'm enjoying my life. And that is just counter -cultural. And it's, it's against the financial planning process. People are like, well, we should start with people's goals. Awesome.
Well, if retirement's not your goal, and passing on money to your generation isn't your goal, then having more money isn't your goal. Like, you know, like, I need enough to enjoy my life. Well, that starts messing with everything else.
Brian (16:56)
You know, and your example speaks to me. I mean, I was a landlord at a rental property in duplex and why? It was to really diversify to save for our kids' college and we sold it last year and we did great. And, you know, that money we will actually never use on ourselves. It will be for our children and all the aggravation between when we bought it and when we sold it was really, you know, for our children. And, you know,
Dr. Bruce Ross (16:56)
Hmm.
Brian (17:25)
for me, it's like, I mean, just open my eyes to this, the reality of like, why you do really look at life differently. And I, as you're talking, the one thing that I continue to go back to is, you know, Hope and I are going to be empty nesters here within the next few years. And really, the conversations aren't about money, the conversations are about how are we going to fill our time, because our time has been filled with our children for our entire marriage. And what what does our life look like?
when it's not and and I'm glad that you're bringing this up when you're talking about this because you really do have to have a reset in how you go about your days and how you spend how you spend your money because now the default of doing things with your kids and their friends and the events it's over and and now it's your it maybe maybe that's good maybe that's bad maybe you're feel liberal liberated maybe you feel scared but the reality is it's different and you need to plan for that
Dr. Bruce Ross (18:09)
Yep.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (18:20)
Well, and for child free people, we actually hit that spot a lot earlier in life. So we have this concept we call the child free midlife crisis. And what happens is when you hit your personal, professional, and financial goals, then it's like, what's next? Okay, so Dr. Ross has about six months before he hits this one hard. You know, when you bet on the academic path, on the tenure track, no, seriously, I'm just calling it out. Like, you're gonna get about six months later and you're like, okay, now I've hit my goals, now what? No, but it -
Brian (18:34)
Yeah.
Dr. Bruce Ross (18:35)
Mm.
Brian (18:43)
You
Dr. Bruce Ross (18:46)
Okay, I'll mark my calendar.
Brian (18:49)
Hehehehe
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (18:51)
For parents, like what'll happen for Brian is probably a few years down the road, you know, it'll be like, well, what's my generational legacy? What do I leave for money? You know, grandkids, like, and what happens to parents is like your goals shift to your kids' goals. There's kind of like a default there. Well, when you don't have that answer, it's like, what do I want to be when I grow up? What's the point of life? Why am I doing it? It is the existential questions that we're answering in our 30s and 40s.
that many parents aren't answering until their 50s or 60s when kids are growing and grandkids or whatever. And it's just a different way of looking at the world. And I will tell you one of the challenges, there's not a lot out there that tells you what to do. Like if you leave the standard script, then you're like, what do I do? What's the point? What am I doing with my life? And why do I keep doing what I'm doing? And you start asking these questions. Dr. Ross, you got any of those yet? Or have we just gotten through tenure like we haven't gotten it?
Dr. Bruce Ross (19:50)
I'm actually starting to formulate some of those answers, but yeah, like you're absolutely right. I think, I don't think it's going to take six months. I think it's, it's already starting to happen of like, what's the next steps? What are my next goals? I got to reset pretty much everything now because of that major goal is hit. So now what's next? You're right.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (20:15)
And now we go into this and say, okay, now we're part of a couple. And the question becomes, what do we want versus what do I want? And how do we find that balance? And my wife and I, we use approach we call the gardener and the rose. Where one's providing support and one's growing and we take turns on it. Right now she's the rose and she got a job offer 1200 miles away. We moved for her, no big deal. Five, seven years down the road, I'm gonna be the rose. I wanna get on a boat and travel the world. It doesn't have to always be work related. There's often ways to do it.
But you now, when you're in that child free midlife crisis as a couple, it's like, all right, well, am I supporting my partner on their goals? Is that my role? Is that my goal? Or am I doing goals for me? Like, do I need a different goal? Do I even have to have a goal? Like, you know, like it's all these big things. And for people that are goal driven, I find I can't get them to stop doing goals. Like I have to, you know, they just need different ones. But I'm like, okay, if money's not your goal.
And a career is not your goal. What matters in life? And for some people, it's, you know, I want to be the best gardener in the world. And some people, it's, you know, I want to learn everything about whatever. Who cares? Whatever it is that you get to choose that. But so much of our society is wrapped around the standard life script, the money, the career. That it's like, well, what do I do? What's the point? That's that, you know, self -actualization type questions that are hard ones.
Dr. Bruce Ross (21:47)
So Brian, you got to start planning now for when you become empty nesters, I guess.
Brian (21:53)
Yeah, we've, we've been talking about it. We just got back from Hawaii and I, it's not that I'm not enjoying my life as a, as a dad, but, there's also, you know, the excitement of being able to kind of, as, as we've talked, you know, kind of being liberated from, responsibilities that are far beyond yourself. And, you know, I know obviously my responsibility as a husband is essential, but you know, one, one of the things that I turned to is this, this book blue zones.
And I think there's a Netflix series on it now, but I'll never forget reading the Blue Zones where the author's a national geographic guy. And essentially he just travels to the world to where there are a disproportionate amount of centenarians, people that are living a hundred to understand why are all these people living so long? What are they doing? And they all, despite the fact that they're all over the world in these like pockets of areas, they do have some things in common, three or four things in common.
Dr. Bruce Ross (22:42)
Mm -hmm.
Brian (22:52)
And one of them is that they always have purpose. There's always meaning. And I think what I love about the conversation today is that purpose, that meaning is not centered around kind of like these artificial goals or I should have said that way, extrinsic goals or intrinsic. They're like, how can I live my life and live it fully and enjoy it and fill my time with the things that give me happiness? And I think that looking at life that way,
is certainly healthier as long as there's purpose behind it. Like what is it that you're trying to do? What's that next thing?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (23:31)
And let me mess with Dr. Ross's head because this is just for him, for fun. By the way, we met at a conference, so we had a conversation beforehand, so I feel a little more comfortable beating him up than Brian.
Brian (23:44)
Hahaha!
Dr. Bruce Ross (23:45)
Hahaha
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (23:47)
So, all right, Brian, your obituary, the second line, how many kids do you have, Brian? Okay, the second line of your obituary will say, you know, Brian died at this age, this location. The second line says, loving father of three leaves behind. Now here's the question for Dr. Ross, what does your second line of your obituary say?
Dr. Bruce Ross (24:10)
Honestly, I don't really care if I have an obituary. So I probably expect to be cremated and that's that.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (24:22)
So, but someone you love is gonna write one of these for you, whether you want it or not. And the second line is really the summary of your old life and like, this is what's on your tombstone, like, what, yo, Dr. Ross, tenured professor at the, I mean, is that really the point? Like, I mean, like, what is it that you're striving towards that is the purpose that brought to Brian's point? Like, what is that line?
And a lot of people will kind of give me the glib response, kind of like you did, like, I don't care what's there. But then like, you kind of start thinking about like, well, no, what is my impact? You know, we're working with child free people and saying, our goal is to help child free people figure out what they want their impact to be and then help them get there. You know, we're not leaving a genetic legacy, but what is that? You know, Brian, Ross shaped hole in the world. Brian's got, you know, here's my kids, that's my life. But what's that, you know, that space?
Brian (25:21)
It'll be something with his dog.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (25:23)
And that's fine.
Dr. Bruce Ross (25:23)
You
Brian (25:27)
Okay, so I've got to know here, like, obviously not all of our listeners are child free or childless. I mean, a lot of them are like me, they're gonna be empty nesters soon. So, you know, based on your experiences, I have a couple questions about that. And this is almost, I don't want to say it's entirely self -serving because it's for our listeners, but I'm intrigued about what you have to say here. So the first question is, what advice do you have for couples on setting new personal and joint goals after their children have moved out?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (25:57)
I think the first thing is to ask, this is Brian, this one's gonna hurt for you, I apologize. So Mike, what I want you to do is pause and go, whose voice is in my head saying I gotta do X? Because there's a script you've been following that says you need to do X. You need to have kids, you need to raise them, you need to do, there's like this story, whether it's culture, family, religion, other things saying you need to do X.
Brian (26:03)
That's okay, that's all right.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (26:25)
And once you figure out by the way whose voice is in your head on that, like that'll set you back for a little bit. But like you start having this discussion as a couple of like, what do I want? Who is Brian? Not who is dad. You know, who am I as a husband? Not who am I as a dad? Like who am I? And both having that conversation. And by the way, you've probably not had to deal with that for quite a while. Is that fair?
Brian (26:30)
Ha ha ha.
Dr. Bruce Ross (26:31)
Yeah.
Brian (26:38)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. I think though, you know, one of the things that I learned when I moved from, I've always lived in Ohio and four or five years ago, I moved from Cincinnati to Atlanta is the importance of friendship. And I had very close friends, we still keep in touch, we still get together across the country and go to big sporting events. And I realized, I think because I was forced to be dislocated from
Dr. Bruce Ross (27:07)
Hmm.
Brian (27:20)
kind of, you know, my world, my comfort zone is the importance of maintaining those friendships and experiences and travel. So I feel like because of that, the fast forward button on these types of questions was hit. And my wife and I know that that's what we want to do. We love doing it. We just got back from Hawaii next year. We're gonna go to Greece and you know, the kids have traveled all over the world. They've had great, but they're at the age where they're like, I don't want to travel with you guys. I want to stay at home.
I don't think they're throwing keggers or anything, you know, because they're, I love my kids are a little nerdy, I would have been throwing keggers, they're far more responsible than me. But, you know, for my wife and I, it's like, how can we really soak up the time that we have together and experience different parts of the world and do it with different do it with friends.
Dr. Bruce Ross (27:51)
Yeah
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (28:06)
That's awesome. And now the question becomes, all right, if we want to do more travel, we want to do more time with friends, what can you shift in your life to do that? So great example is I've been talking to a lot of folks about doing like a phased retirement where maybe we're working 80 % of the time or 70%. Like, can we shift our life and our finances to then match our values? So if your values are time with friends and time traveling,
Brian (28:21)
Interesting.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (28:33)
What would happen if you, you know, say somebody, he works two months, take one month off. And that's what he does. And the one month off, travels with friends. You know, could you and your wife figure out something like that to get more quality time doing the things that you value?
Brian (28:43)
Wow.
Dr. Bruce Ross (28:44)
Well, yeah.
Brian (28:51)
Wow, I love that. I had never considered some sort of circumstance like that because I don't think that we would enjoy like an abrupt conclusion to our professional lives. I feel like that we both enjoy our jobs, but I do like the idea of kind of a shift.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (29:13)
Yep, the technical term HR calls it a phased retirement and sometimes it means like I cut back to 80 % or you know I'd only work four days a week or like and people go well Can I really do that like will my employer go with that? I'm like, well, do you have skills your employer wants and if the answer is yes, they'll do it like you know, like I mean, you know Yeah, the academic world has a sabbatical for that reason and you know, there's there's ways Can I take as unpaid time off whatever it is because now?
Brian (29:17)
Okay.
Dr. Bruce Ross (29:20)
Thank you.
Yep.
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (29:42)
Money's not driving your decision making. It's a question of is your time, your money, your effort going to what you value? If that connection with friends and travel is, how do you make that shift? Because the reality check is at some point you've earned enough money that it doesn't really matter.
Brian (29:59)
Well, we love, this has been a great conversation and we try to have everything coalesced into kind of like one simple piece of advice to bring the podcast episode to a conclusion. So knowing that, what is that one piece of simple and actionable advice for our listeners that you would like to conclude with today?
Jay Zigmont, PhD, MBA, CFP® (30:23)
If nothing else, you just take away one thing. How do you make your finances more simple so your life can be amazing? Yeah, I'm having Brian quit back, cut back his work, sell his property. Like, how do you simplify it so that you can have an amazing life? And when you start pulling that apart, people go, well, why am I doing X? And I'm like, I don't know. Like, does it make your life more amazing or does it make your finances more simple? And if you can't answer that question, you shouldn't do it.