Your guilt is their product.

Added: 2026-05-28

[00:00:00]Stop feeling guilty about your 401k. The guilt is actually the product.

[00:00:03]Responsibility isn't putting money where society tells you. Responsibility is putting money where it actually grows.

[00:00:09]Nobody's ever said, "I'm so glad I maxed out my 401k because it just really improved my life along the way." Nobody, ever. It's always about like one day, someday, but never today. The financial industry made retirement accounts feel like a must-have, like it's a requirement, right? Your responsibility.

[00:00:26]If you miss a contribution, well, then you're irresponsible. But, you're feeding someone else's account while your own business could actually probably grow the capital better. This couple I started working with back in 2008, they were maxing out their SEP IRA and 401k while they watched the market go down. It was creating tons of stress, and yet they're locking their money away because that's what everybody told them to do. They had an idea for a coffee company, but they were wondering the best way to fund it to get this thing started. But, they actually had all the money they needed in their 401k, but they didn't want to pay that 10% penalty. The 10% seemed too steep, and the word penalty kept them away. I know, I I went to Catholic school. Penalties get you hit with a ruler. But, if they had to give up 10% equity or pay 10% or more to borrow the money every single year, that actually punished them.

[00:01:07]That'd be the real penalty. So, I helped switch and change their how they viewed this, right? I asked them if they'd take a loan for a one-time 10% with no interest any year after. They're like, "Of course."

[00:01:18]So, instead of thinking of it like a penalty, it was merely the cost to get to their money. Now, a decade later, the valuation of that coffee company is 40 times what their retirement plan would have been. 40 times. They'd only been feeding the 401k because that's what every advisor and all the books they're reading, that's what they'd told them to do. The account that everyone else told them was required to be financially responsible was the one actually holding them back. Funding someone else's vision, following someone else's plan before your own, it's not going to create the freedom you seek. You lose control, there is no cash flow, and worse, you just partnered with the government. That $100,000 penalty saved them $7 million they would have given to an investor.

[00:01:55]Invest in what you know. That's where you're really going to grow.