As we head into the holiday season—a time of giving, gathering, and let’s be honest… spending—it’s easy to feel the pressure that money can place on our relationships and our well-being.

That’s why I’m re-sharing one of my favorite conversations with Chad Hufford, a financial advisor who goes beyond spreadsheets and budgets to focus on something much deeper: our relationship with money.

If you're feeling the weight of holiday expenses or just want to approach the new year with more clarity and confidence around your finances, this episode offers the mindset shifts and practical habits that can help.

Let’s revisit this powerful conversation with Chad Hufford—and explore how redefining wealth might just bring you more peace this season.

Highlights:

• Shift your mindset around money to see it as a tool for creating freedom, not just a means for survival.
• Develop habits that build long-term wealth through consistency, patience, and intentional decision-making.
• Learn how financial independence isn’t about luck—it’s about strategic planning and disciplined execution.
• Explore ways to improve financial conversations within your family to create a stronger, healthier money mindset.
• Understand why small financial choices today can lead to major financial security in the future.

Connect with Chad:

Website: https://www.veritasalaska.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chad-hufford-066208100/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/veritas.alaska/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VeritasWealthManagement/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@veritasalaska

Book: Forging Financial Freedom

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A LinkedIn Checklist for setting up your fully optimized Profile:

An opportunity to test drive the Follow Up system I recommend by checking this presentation page - you won’t regret it. 

AND … Don’t forget to connect with me on LinkedIn and be eligible for my complimentary LinkedIn profile audit – I do one each month for a lucky listener!

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http://JanicePorter.com

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Chad, Hello everyone, and welcome to this

week's episode of relationships rule. This week, we're going to

talk about a topic that impacts every business owner,

entrepreneur and individual, our relationship with money. My

guest is Chad Hufford, a top ranked financial planner and the

owner of Veritas wealth management. Chad is known for

helping his clients not only build wealth, but also align

their financial decisions with their values, creating a

fulfilling a fulfilling and abundant life. And I think I

have to start with, first of all, welcome. Welcome to the

show.

Chad Janice, thank you so much for having me. It's

a great opportunity to be here and an honor to encourage your

audience and help them pursue a more abundant life.

Thank you appreciate that. And I guess I

have to start with what I was going to interject when I was

introducing you is, this is not a topic I'm really fond of.

Okay, money, talking about money, money. I love money. And

I love having, you know, being able to earn money and, and it's

funny, on Sunday, I was just talking offline with you about

my granddaughter. On Sunday, she went and she helped, walked into

our garage to look for something, and she came back,

and she had a jar with her that had money in it, like coins and

some paper roll, a roller, rolling things for putting money

in. And there were pennies and quarters and dimes and a few

coins from somewhere else, and an old Canadian $2 bill, which

we haven't seen for years anyway, she found this she said,

I found this money, Grandma, can I have it? And I said, Well, I

don't know. I'm not sure whose money it is, Amara. And she

said, I said, but let's put it down, out on the floor, and

let's count it, let's separate it, let's sort it here. I'm the

teacher in me starts right away and and so she did, and we had

this great little time with you know, the pennies are here and

the quarters are here. And I'm like, which do you think is the

most money? Which pile has the most money? And she went to the

pennies, and I said, Well, let's put, let's put the quarters in

piles of four, and then we're going to count them, and then

we'll put the pennies in piles of 10, and we're going to count

them. And we had to do, you know, I had to keep reminding

her she's only five. And anyway, whether it's Sun kin or not, we

had a few math lessons along the way, and so that was kind of

fun. But generally speaking, I really don't like talking about

money, because I'm not very good with it. So I'm going to say to

you, how do you see a person's relationship with money

influencing their personal and professional relationships?

Because if what I say is true, I'm probably having a bad time.

But Well, I think your experiences is fairly

normal, and I think a lot of us grew up in households where

money was mostly taboo. The only time it was brought up was under

stressful circumstances. Maybe somebody made a bad financial

decision, somebody lost their job. There maybe was a a health

care cost that Nobody's expecting, and mom and dad

aren't sure how ends are going to be, or mom Maybe mom and dad

were fighting about money. If you grew up in a house where

money was always a streaming match between mom and dad, like,

yeah, you're not going to have a great relationship with it. And

I think that's where what you just did with Amara is so

powerful, is you normalized having a conversation about

money under a healthy and calm circumstance. And that's how I

grew up. But I really, I realized later in life that that

wasn't normal to just have, just have normal, basic conversations

about money. So I'll just give you a little metaphor. But I

think just like our health, it can be overwhelming, like

there's all these, all these opinions out there. Everybody on

podcast has an idea, everybody on Instagram is an expert, and

we hear all this conflicting information about money and our

health, and I think the tendency for some people is just, I'm

just gonna stick my head in the sand. This is overwhelming. I'm

not gonna deal with it. I don't have the right information. I'm

just gonna ignore it. And our physical health, just like our

financial health, the the only thing necessary for those areas

of our life to deteriorate is negligence our we will not

develop a better relationship with money. We will not develop

a healthier financial situation or a healthier body by

neglecting those areas. So whether you want it to be a part

of your life or not, it is, we don't really have a choice. So

my goal, one of one of the reasons I believe I'm here on

Earth is to help people create a better relationship with money.

Because money is a wonderful servant, it is a terrible

master.

Oh, I love that. Money is a wonderful servant.

It's a terrible master. And I get it, because a lot of what

you said really rang true with me in that I had to. Deal

several years ago, I realized that I was I had a very I had a

very contentious relationship and a lot of anger around my

father after he died, and it was all about money and and I had to

deal with it, and it took me a long time, but I did do some

work around it. And it kind of, I think I freed that, that

anger, so that I could move forward and and you're right,

because money was my dad used to say to my mom all the time,

don't worry about it, dear. I'll look after it. Don't worry about

it. I've got it, you know. And so she never knew how to write a

check after my dad died, you know. So there was that anyway,

there's a whole, you know, it should be on the couch to do

with that, going through a psych visit with somebody, but, but

you do learn as you go through life. You know what you can do

and what you there's no shoulds right? But I love what you said,

that it's about, you know, it's often about stress, or it's

about those, those, it adages that we hear when we're kids,

money grows on doesn't grow on trees. You know, all of those

things that we grew up with. I grew up with some of those, and

it can affect a lot. So when did you, I mean, have you always had

a good relationship with money? Or when did you decide this was

your path? I'd love to know how you got there.

So I think, just like any relationship, there's

struggles, right? There's there's good times, there's bad

times. I mean, I have my own scarcity journey as well,

starting this business, and I started in 2007 and a financial

practice in 2007 as the world was starting to slowly burn

down, and then in 2008 and 2009 the burning down process just

sped up. It was a very, very hard time. And I remember a time

when Janice, I'll be honest, I was doubting myself, not just

not just professionally, but even as a father, my wife came

from poverty and and we had two kids, one on the way, we were

not even getting our basic bills paid every month. And I'm just

wondering, how are we going to get out of this? What is going

to happen? And I it was very emasculating. I felt like, I

mean, one of the reasons I chose this profession is to give my

wife stability, but it wasn't there. And we, we didn't know

even how to pay for basic, basic groceries. And one day, we're

coming home from from my parents house, and we pull up in the

driveway, somebody left a box of groceries on our front door. So

door, and it was maybe 80 100 bucks worth of groceries, but I

just remember how impactful that was. It was just like a reminder

that I'm not alone in this. But it was, it was a very dark time

in my life, and I didn't realize it then, but looking back now,

is dealing. I was battling depression, and so I think we

all have scars. And to answer your question, I think for the

most part, I've had a good relationship with money, but I

still can fall back into that scarcity mindset and and money

is easy to measure, which means money can sometimes be the goal

of the objective, rather than a means to the end. So So I want a

more fulfilling life. I want to live a life of more abundance

and impact that and impact. That's hard to measure. I can

measure money. I want to have X amount of dollars to my name by

the time I'm such and such an age. That's a lot easier to

measure than the impact I'm having. So I think it's a

constant battle to make sure that we're all viewing money as

a means to an end and not the end in itself. So I would say I

am blessed to have been introduced to good money

management principles very early on. My parents didn't just teach

us that. They modeled that. But I can't say that I've always had

a great relationship with money, and we've had our struggles.

I've made my dumb decisions. When I was 19, I had three

different vehicles, you know, just I felt like I'd never had

money before. You know, I felt like I was rich and I just doing

dumb things with it. But where did it start? So my degree is in

biochemistry. I was actually headed into medicine. Oh, wow.

And but I realized the impact that money has on people's

lives. And because of growing up in a household where my dad was

in the financial industry, we talked about money, it was

normalized. As an adult, I saw how destructive and

dysfunctional poor relationships money can money can have in

people's lives and the negative ripple effect. But I also saw

the opposite growing up. I saw that when people start

controlling their money, rather than having to control them,

when they start having confidence that that also has a

ripple effect into every area of their life. And I saw my dad

taught classes in our church in the community. He helped people

become better stewards of their money. So it actually became a

two. School, rather than something that controlled them.

And I just realized this is, this is a wonderful opportunity,

not just to change somebody's financial life, but to change

their trajectory as a whole, and that's ultimately why I chose

this path.

So I think I remember that you were, you were

in the Were you an athletic trainer?

Yes, I so there's a time in my life where I was in

the middle of this pivot where I realized medicine was probably

not going to be the career for my family. It was, I still have

a passion for it, I would say, okay, but it wasn't going to

line up with my family goals, and I wasn't sure what to do, so

I started personal training, and I know it's one of your

daughters used to own a cross, so it's a big part of your

family, too. And it was something that I could scale

very quickly, sure, but I didn't want to do it forever, right? So

I was working with professional athletes, some Olympians, and

got some contracts working with the military, did some stuff

with the local police department, and it really kind

of got me into this coaching mindset. And it was even though

it felt like a detour, or it felt like I was just biding my

time, what it did is help develop my coaching ability,

because coaching is helping somebody create a better

relationship with whatever tool that you're using to create

victory in their life, to become a better version of themselves.

So I realized my goal wasn't just to help people identify a

better financial plan and better investments, but to actually

help them become a better investor, to actually coach them

to to have a better relationship with their finances. And I think

that period in my life in between medicine and in finance

was was really a great training ground for that skill set.

Well, especially, I'm thinking when you're working

with professional athletes and military people who have such

great commitment for what they're doing that that also can

cross over into teaching people mindset and discipline around

money, right? Because, yeah, so did that feel like you know that

that went with you when you or were you, were you actually

coaching the the you know what I'm trying to say, it's not

about money, particularly, because you weren't there yet,

but you were doing the things that that taught that commitment

that could cross over.

Yes, so I think what you're asking is, I'll just

answer what I think you're asking. So the character

qualities, the the temperaments necessary for an athlete to be

successful in their sport, for a soldier to be prepared to go

deploy, are the exact same temperaments and character

qualities necessary to have a good relationship with money and

to build financial independence. I did not know that at the time,

and then I saw all these parallels. And there's actually

a book that I read on an airplane to a wedding, and I

thought it's called simple wealth, inevitable wealth, by a

man named Nick Murray. And I said, this is the message I need

to take into the world, and I have the skills to do it,

because I've been doing it with high level athletes for a long

time on athletic standpoint, if I can help people utilize the

tools that are already available to them to build better physical

fitness, to build more mental toughness, I can do the exact

same thing with with investors to build a better life, but it

still requires the grit, the mental toughness, the the

discipline, the perseverance, the the temporary sacrifice, all

those things were were very much a part of both fields, and it

really was a huge blessing to have what felt like a little bit

of a detour actually, very much prepared me for what I'm doing

now, right?

That's exactly what I was asking. Okay, so I

that does make me want to ask now, though, your take on, or

whether, I don't know if you have any or many professional

athletes or high level athletes who are clients of yours, but

there's so many you know that I'm into the basketball world.

My family's a basketball family, and you see these kids today?

Well, even you know, well, no, Kobe Bryant's an anomaly. But I

mean, he, I've just been watching his the documentary of

about him on CNN, and they showed a picture of him

announcing after high school that he was going right into the

NBA Draft. Well, he's an anomaly, as I said, anyway,

because he was so focused from when he was a kid to what his

goals were, that I would imagine that his financial goals would

have been handled better than most. But you see these young

kids going into professional sports, and they have no idea,

and they come. From poor backgrounds, and all they do is

they've got all this, these diamonds around their neck, and

they're, you know, what would you say? What? What do you work

with any of these types of people? Or what would you say to

somebody like that? Because you don't want them to piss it all

away, to be rude, but

no, but it's so I believe wealth is like a weight.

So if you, if you have somebody who was, we'll just use this,

like CrossFit analogy, somebody who's been in the gym, they've

been taking classes with your daughter for years, you put a

weight on their back. That weight can actually make them

stronger. They're prepared for it. They know how to use it. You

take somebody that's never been inside of a gym, or hasn't

touched a gym in 20 years, you put 300 pounds on their back,

it's going to harm them. And I think whether it's a celebrity

or a college athlete or a young person coming into a lot of

money, they get this weight of wealth that might help them, had

they been more prepared. But because they're not, it, it

crushes them and it I think wealth, it just like any tool

can be destructive if it's not wielded properly. And in in our

culture, in our society, we Janice we we believe we can fix

money management or money problems with more money, and

it'd be like fixing poor driving with more horsepower, like

giving my 16 year old daughter, who's had two accidents in the

last 30 days, giving her a faster car to deal with the fact

that she keeps running into other people's cars. It doesn't

work because it's the individual behavior, it's the relationship

between her and the car that needs to change. We can swap out

the car all day, but until she learns how to better manage the

road, the vehicle itself and the awareness, yes, the car is just

the medium, and that's what we need to realize. We can't We

can't just add more money to the equation. If somebody is a poor

steward of a modest amount of money, we give them millions, it

becomes even more destruct we've given them a bigger, more

harmful, not more harmful tool, but a a more powerful tool with

which they can hurt themselves, right?

Yeah, good point. So it was a question I had here.

I wanted to ask you. Okay, I have a couple. So you emphasize,

I my notes here, you emphasize patience and choosing the hard

right over the easy wrong. I love that the hard right over

the easy wrong. How does that philosophy strengthen client

relationships?

Well, number one, it's it's necessary in almost

all walks of life. Usually the easy choice in the moment puts

us on a wrong path in the future. We if we choose

temporary comfort or temporary relief, there's usually a cost

we pay in the future. And I'll just, I'll just give you. We

already talked about Kobe Bryant. So if I can use the Kobe

Bryant story, he is an anomaly, but there's a lot we can learn

from him. After games, when everybody else would go out

drinking, he would go hit the gym and and work on the things

that he felt needed to be polished. Even if they won the

game and he had a great game, maybe he would do dribbling

drills if he had too many turnovers, sometimes he would go

shoot 1000 free throws. He would do he would go into a dark gym

where nobody saw him and work quietly mastering mundane tasks.

Now, everybody celebrates the highlight reel dunks and the

6070, point games and all that stuff, but all that came from

those dark moments in the gym where nobody was watching and

building wealth is the same thing. People celebrate the, you

know, the fancy retirement and going on the cruises and the

nice cars and all that. But for the people who manage money,

well, those that's not what got them there. That's what that is

a byproduct of the things they did behind closed doors for

years and years and years. And here's what makes Kobe an

anomaly. He did it by himself. You go, most people need

somebody by their side as an accountability partner, somebody

shoulder to shoulder along the journey with them to get them to

do that, whether it's a workout partner, whether it's an

accountability partner. In our case, we are accountability

partners for finances and for wealth, but it's keeping people

mastering the mundane, keeping them on the difficult path when

they're making sacrifices, temporary sacrifices in the

moment, for a better future. Most people need somebody in

their corner holding them accountable, but also reminding

them of what is the payoff going to be? Right? It's only

temporary. This is not forever. There's a better future out

there waiting because you're willing to do the hard thing.

Now. It's so true. It's so true and and when

I look back, you know, if I were to do it differently today, you

know, it. There are so many things I would do differently

that I didn't know, I didn't understand, and I didn't want to

know at the time, because I was a product. Personally, me, I was

a product of that dad who said, don't worry about it. I'll look

after it. And that's what I heard all the time, right? And,

and that's just me. Then my my husband, other story, right? You

know, so I don't want to get into it, but, you know,

everyone's different, right? And they have different angles

around money, but it makes it difficult to you have to work

through it, and you have to want to work through it. Okay, so

who's your Well, let me just clarify something in your

company, Veritas, Wealth Management, do you focus on like

long term or do you have different kinds of clients that

have different risk tolerances, that you do different things

with? That would be the we do so

we tailor somebody's financial plan to

their specific goals. Okay? And their financial plan then

dictates the investment strategy. And a lot of a lot of

places do this backwards, a lot of a lot of individuals, they

kind of collect investments for 30 years and then try to throw

it together two years before retirement and make a financial

house out of it. What we tell people is, you wouldn't, you

wouldn't buy a house that was built without a blueprint. You

shouldn't build your future without one either. And the idea

is that we take long term goals. Janice, what do you want your

life to look like if you never had to work another day in your

life you didn't need to produce a paycheck? What would you be

doing? Who would you be spending time with? We We want to make it

about life goals and lifestyle goals, rather than simply money

goals. Now we have to attach some money goals to that, but

then we reverse engineer that process to where they are today.

But objectives dictate the plan. The plan dictates the

investments and the investments or the tail. We want to make

sure that the tail doesn't wag the dog. And too often, people

are changing their investments around because of what's going

on in the economy or what they think might happen. Maybe it's

an election cycle. They're changing their investments even

though their long term goals haven't changed, and that's

where that accountability is important. We want to make sure

that if, if they're in the right investments, even if it's

uncomfortable, that they stick it out, that they weather the

storms. But to answer your question, everybody's plan and

investment strategy is tailored to what their needs are, rather

than tailored to whatever people think is happening next in the

markets or things like that, because that is a fool's errand.

You should invest based on your goals, based on what is

important and meaningful to you, not what's going on in the

economy.

Does that mean also, then that, because the way

your company is structured, you have, you can choose whatever

you want to for that investment, for someone you're not tied to,

I've got to push these bonds this week or this now, okay,

oh, it's, it's yes, and it's such, and this is

what was so hard getting started, because I got started

independently. I wasn't tied to another financial firm, because

I wanted that independence. I wanted to be able to meet with

somebody, connect with them on a personal level, find out what

was important to them, attach some goals to it, and then go

find the tools necessary to build the life that that

individual wanted. I mean, right now, what we're seeing is

everybody comes in with these target date funds. They're this

one size fits all, which means one size fits nobody, and

they're they're not tailored to anything specifically. And I

never wanted to be like that. I never wanted to have a list of

products where, Janice, I've got this little box that I'm trying

to jam you into. It's more about you tell me what you need to

build, and then we'll go out and we'll find the best tools, yeah,

yeah.

I think that's I've always liked, that, that

style, or in that, that process better.

Well, can I give you a quick metaphor? Yes. Think

about this from a health perspective. You go to a doctor.

You walk in the doctor's office, you, you, you don't even fill

out a form yet. You don't know anything about you, and they

start telling you about all the most popular prescriptions that

they can write and all the benefits, all these things. And

by the way, there's some really popular procedures. Everybody's

doing this thing, and we'll schedule like, what? What is a

good day for your surgery? You're like, whoa. You don't

even know what's wrong. Like, you don't even know why I came

in here yet. Now you're laughing, no, but it's a great

analogy. The financial industry does the exact same thing. We're

so product focused, we haven't even we haven't even talked to

the person about what they want their solution to look like. And

I think my industry needs to learn from that, that it's about

finding out what this person needs, not trying to sell them

what is popular. Because ultimately, we're not selling

anything. What we need is people to buy in. They're buying into a

journey with us. It's a partnership. The investments are

just the tools. It's the partnership that makes a

difference. I mean, going back to basketball, yeah, everybody

uses a basketball. Everybody we. But the basketball, the shoes,

the court, all those things are commodities. They're all

basically the same. It's how the team functions together that

makes all the difference. It's all about relationships. It's

all about the the connectedness within that team. And I believe

finance is no different.

You know that you just reminded me of a funny

story. My mother was was widowed. She was in her 60s, and

as I told you, she didn't know how to write a check, so she had

to learn all the basics of looking after her her finances.

And she started by having a good friend of hers, a woman who had

been a bookkeeper teacher some of the basics, right? And then

she found she got, I don't know how who, where this person came

from, but she got a financial planner, and this guy's name was

Ed. And every time we had to talk to my mom about money,

she'd say, I don't know. I have to ask Ed. And this went on for

years. I'll have to check with Ed. And it became like a joke,

right? Because I lived here, she lived I lived in Vancouver, she

lived in LA, my sister lived in LA, but we never met Ed, right?

But we knew Ed existed, and she, like she wanted to buy a new

car, so she get ed to help her and see if she could move her

money. She didn't. She didn't get left as much she as

comfortably as she should have been, but that's the whole story

about my dad. But so she had to be careful of her money. So it

was always ed. So my mom died many years later, and we had to

talk to Ed, because Ed was still in the picture. And so my sister

and I went to meet him, and he was the nicest guy. And you

know, he he'd done the best he could with her. I don't know. I

mean, I don't really know, you know, the details of how it all

went, but it was so silly. It was so fun, like we went to meet

Ed. And the other piece of that is my sister now uses

Ed. Oh, that's funny, which I this

thought was so funny. I don't know how old he

is now, but, but anyway, I just thought that was funny. The

trust that she had in this guy, and we didn't know who he was,

well,

and that's just the trust, but the partnership,

where they obviously had a dialog going. She wasn't just

asking investing questions. She was no and that's and that's

what's so important about this is we realized that because most

people did grow up where finances are taboo, we're asking

questions that their best friend, your best friends, your

family members don't even have the answers to right? It's very,

very intimate, and it creates it requires time and a lot of

relationship capital to build that intimacy, but it sounds

like your mom and Ed developed that where they were working

together. She wasn't asking for Ed's permission or anything, but

she trusted his guidance. Said, Hey, this is a big decision.

Before I make that, yeah, I want to circle ed in and make sure we

do this the right way, so that that actually warms my heart,

and I'm glad you finally got a chance to meet

him, yeah, yeah, no, it was so funny. Anyway,

okay, so I'm thinking not big bit big business things right

now, because I keep thinking about the fact that you have, is

it six kids? We have six kids. Yeah, have six kids. And I have

a question here that makes me think, because my granddaughter

as well. Okay, what advice would you have for families to build

healthier conversations around money, but also, like, as as an

example, you know, what do you teach your kids about money? Did

they have or do they have allowances? Or is that a no no?

Like, there's different takes on things like that. So I'm just

curious.

Well, I already, I already kind of praised you

earlier, and I want to do it again, because you took an

opportunity to have a conversation with your with your

granddaughter, Amara, and you, you there's a math lesson in it.

Like, there's all kinds of wonderful things that you did

totally but, but I taught elementary school, so

it was just like, right in my element, until she loses

interest, yeah,

but you normalized it. And I think that's what

people need to realize. Even if you don't know a lot about

finances, you might not feel like you have a lot of wisdom.

That's fine. Just open up the conversation. It might even be

explained to your kids, like, Hey, this is what's confusing to

me about they changed some stuff in our 401 k this week at work,

and I don't even know what it's talking about, just something

like that. You could even express your confusion around

money. You're like, Hey, here's something I don't know. We're

going to figure this out together as a family, but

normalizing those conversations, because conversations about

money will happen by design or by default. If you design

conversations around money, they can be healthy, they can even be

fun. I'm saying that as a nerd, so maybe it's not your version

of fun, but it can actually be something that draws the family

closer together. I hear you, but if money conversations happen by

default, it will usually happen under stress, and even people

who do very, very well. Financially. And I get connected

with a lot of people that they're they're multi

millionaires, they have a lot of wealth, but they still live in a

scarcity mindset, because, like we talked about earlier, we

can't fix money issues with more money. So if you take somebody

who has traumatic money experiences, and you don't fix

that relationship, giving them more money just gives them more

money to worry about it actually makes the problem worse. So even

people who are really wealthy, we see you talk about athletes

buying all the the jewelry, which my son taught me the other

day, they call it ice, or icing, or something like

that, ice. Yeah,

sure, yeah. But I mean, I'm not trying to

psychoanalyze these people, but some of that might be them

trying to to distance themselves from that scarcity environment,

you know, and it's we all do it different ways. But I think just

having those conversations, opening up with your kids, it

doesn't matter so much what you're even talking about, to a

point it just matters that you're talking about it, and you

give you open up the freedom for them to talk about money, to ask

questions about money, and even if you aren't very savvy with

your own money, maybe it's something that you guys can

learn together. Um, yeah, I think Do you believe

in allowances or not?

So I got a funny story on that. So I have six

kids, but I'm still figuring this out. They're all so

different. And you know, as a parent, you try to pretend like

you've you've got everything lined out and figured out, and

then your teenagers start calling you out, and then you

both realize that, yeah, we don't know what we're doing. But

anyway, with six kids, I should by now, but every now and then,

I have one of those aha moments where, like, something works,

something clicked. So this is a couple years ago. My youngest

right now, they're six and four, but this they were four and two

at the time, and they walk up to me. Everybody else is gone. My

wife had the older kids, and the four year old is the

spokesperson. He comes up says, Dad, we need to talk. And I

thought, where this is gonna go? He goes, Dad, Barrett and I were

talking, and we need money. It's like, okay, so four and two,

they had a discussion. They go to dad, we need money. Where in

the world is this going? So the next thing out of his mouth, he

said, What kind of jobs do you have for us so we can earn it?

Oh, and I thought, You know what, I'm doing, something,

right? So for two hours, we were out in the yard. We were pulling

weeds and trimming hedges and things like that. And I was so

proud of these guys and a little proud of myself. And my wife

gets home and she's like, why are my babies all scratched up

and bleeding and dirty? I was like, they were working anyways.

Um, but we do, we do try to, even if it's menial stuff, but

get them to attach production and service to money that if,

first of all, if you, if you want something, let's, let's

attach a goal to it. How much is that going to cost? And maybe

even set up some parameters on how long it might take you, you

know, for our younger ones, if they want to buy a $20 toy, it's

going to take them a little while to earn that but then

lining up. What is that pathway? What are the types of jobs you

can do to earn that thing? How can you serve your family? How

can you serve the people around you? My My mom lives just a mile

away. So they do. She's 77 she has a very high we'll just call

it a labor intensive property, just some land and things like

that. So they go like, how can you serve grandma to earn some

money? And really trying to attach those two that the more

you serve people around you, the bigger the impact you make in

the lives of those in your circle, the more your own needs

will be will be met. So that's what we really try to instill,

rather than just giving them a flat allowance.

Okay, so I think we need to, we need to switch

that up a little bit with Amara and and instill that a little

bit more. What we've noticed since Christmas she got, oh, I

know she, she goes to the coffee shop with mom and Grandpa

sometimes, and mom and Grandpa might have a card, gift card

with money on it. She said, I want my own gift card. She

wanted her own to get her own drink, right? So for Christmas,

she got one. So she got 10 hot chocolates on it, or something

like that. So she got to do that, but she goes, if she earns

the right by doing something really good, she gets to go to

the dollar store, because she loves the dollar store, and she

will have her own money that maybe was a gift for her

birthday or whatever in her piggy bank, and she gets to

spend X amount of money at the dollar store. So there's lessons

there. And, no, I can't afford that. Yes, I can whatever, and

stuff like that, but I think we need that earning piece in there

as well. So yeah,

well, and even one of the things I was thinking

about, maybe my son and your your granddaughter should meet,

they might be a cute. Couple but, but also trade offs too. Is

it okay? You know, you saved up $6 for this toy, but you also

want this other toy. So if you buy this one, you don't get

that's a lesson a lot of adults don't get. We want it all, I

know. We want the nice vacation. We want the nice car. We also

want our weekends. We don't want to have to the overtime. There's

always trade offs. And again, it's being intentional about

that, because a lot of times people make decisions and the

trade off costs them way more in the long run than they ever

anticipated, but they don't think about it at the outset. So

just talking to our kids about, okay, that's, yeah, you've

earned the money. That's great, but if you buy that. That means

you can't do these other maybe you can't, maybe you can't buy

the hot chocolate tomorrow. Or, you know, maybe you you can't do

that thing with your friends. And we don't make them earn

everything. I mean, I get it. We'll feed our kids and stuff,

yeah, but trying to work those lessons into everyday life, and

James, we're not perfect. We're I Bumble up all the time, but

what I want is my kids to feel like they can come to me with

those questions and when they're when they're 16, or when they're

18 or when they're 25 and they're in a tough financial

spot that they feel comfortable saying, Dad, we know you screwed

up. You've made mistakes. I made one of my own. Can you walk with

me and help me figure this out? Yeah, yeah, not and not feeling

like they have to pretend to be perfect, because that's what

happens now, is we all put on it. We cover up our financial

sins with credit cards, yeah, and nobody sees what's going on.

We pretend like we got everything figured out. And

yeah, we have the nice clothes, we have a nice car, but we're

drowning in debt. We're not sleeping at night. We're

fighting with our spouse, and just to be able to admit I'm

struggling right now I need some help. That's so freeing when

people can cross that so with my kids, James, that's what I want,

is for them to have the freedom to ask questions, to express

frustrations, and just to have a healthy dialog about money.

Amen.

Amen. Amen on that in your setup. Business

wise, are you? I'm thinking this because I have a friend who I

want to listen to your podcast, because he's a in Canada. Here,

there are different types of financial planners like they'll

take percentages, right or commissions, front end loaded,

or back end loaded, or whatever. And then there's what he is. Is

a for he's a fee based financial planner, so you pay for his

services, but he doesn't put you in certain products, like you he

would do what was the best thing, and he's building a plan

with you, is that the way your business works still probably

similar.

There's different ways to do the fee, but we are

fiduciary, which means we have not just a regulatory

obligation, but a moral obligation to do what's in the

best interest of the individual, not to sell a particular

product. So we make the same regardless of what Fund Company

somebody uses, the types of funds that the type of

investments we make the same amount, and it takes away any

potential conflict of interest, but also puts us on the same

side of the table, where, in order for us to do better, that

family, that client, needs to do better. And when, when we're in

the middle of a financial storm, and they see their 401, K,

looking like a 301, K. Or they see, you know, this big account

temporarily go down. They see it in their statement. We feel it

in our paychecks. So we're weathering it together. And I

think that there's a sense of camaraderie that comes out of

that. We felt it in 22 back during covid in 2020 when the

markets across the globe went down together, for people to

know that we were all experiencing discomfort

together, I think was actually really empowering. That sounds

weird, but it allowed people to stay the course, because they

realized, you know what, we're all in this together. I'm not

alone in my financial journey.

Okay, so last sort of financial question here

for me, it would be okay. Nobody has those, you know, glasses

that we can see into the future. But with what's going on in your

country these days, what are you telling people? Because surely

the god people are calling you and either going one way or the

other, you know, like we're glad this is happening, or, Oh, my

God. So what are you telling people?

It's very polarizing. You're right, and

what I'm telling people is to stay focused on your long term

goals. Don't let what's going on in the country, the economy or

in the world around us dictate your investing decisions. Do

those things have an impact? Yes. But can you control them?

No. And too often, my industry puts so much focus on all the

things we can't control, elections, interest rates, the

economy, wars, in the Middle East, Ukraine, Russia, all that

stuff matters, but we can't do anything about it. So if we're

so focused on the short term things that we can't control,

we'll miss the impact on the long. Long term things that we

can control. So it's always putting people's perspective

back to their goals, their long term plan. Are my current

actions aligned with where I want to be and what I want to be

doing in the future, and looking past this crazy world that we

live in right now?

Well, when you say we can't do anything about

it, I mean, we can as little bit of it. We could all do a little

bit to make it better, one way or the other. And I'm not going

to get into red or blue, but, but I mean, right,

yeah, no, you're right. And I'm not like, yeah,

don't take that the wrong way. It's voting and being involved

in your community. And we, we being involved. You have the

opportunity to to have some, but it's very like, you can't

control interest rates. You can't No, no, I know. So yeah,

do what you can in those areas. Yeah. But the problem jazz is

sometimes people spend hours a day focusing on that. Gosh,

yeah, you know. And it takes up not just so much of their time,

but it takes their energy. It takes their focus. It creates

myopic thinking, and in it, it destroys a long term

perspective. Because of everything we're looking at is

the here and now. We can't see the future. You can't have

reading glasses on and see something two miles away, right?

It brings your focus into what's right in front of you, and it it

also, I think it can actually create a state of learned

helplessness. If we are so focused on the things that we we

don't have much influence over some or very little or none at

all, then the story that we start telling ourselves is, in

order for me to to be financially independent, I have

to get lucky. I'm just going to sit here and all these things

need to line up in my favor and stop saying, you what? Maybe

some I've got some things going against me. Maybe there are some

hurdles, but there's, there's a lot I can't control, but there's

a lot that I can do to improve my my situation, and, if nothing

else, my relationship with money. And that's where this

process is going to start.

That's a great place to end. I think that's

amazing. And I think we've we covered the gamut from the macro

to the micro to the macro and and I know that you, I can tell

that you're passionate about what you do and that you care

about people. And I think that ultimately, is, is the, is the

the goal, right? That you're helping people lead better have

better lives and have a better understanding of the power of

money, but that it's that, what did you say money, when it

masters?

Money is a wonderful servant, right? The

terrible master, right?

Love that I got to write that one down. I like

that one. Thank you again for being here. One last question,

can you let us know? And I'll put it in the show notes, how my

audience can get hold of you, and I didn't even mention but I

think it was maybe a couple of years ago. You have a book

called it. Wasn't that long ago.

It was. It was spring of 24 forging financial

freedom. It came out right early in 2024

which I'm guessing covers a lot of what

you talked about today.

Okay, it's very much about the mindset. It's our

perspective around money. There's a lot of of protocols

and processes that books can teach on how to build wealth and

financial independence. Financial independence, but

there's not a lot of books on how to think differently about

money. So I wrote the book that I wish I had read 20 years ago

to help people create a better relationship with money so they

can use the already existing tools and processes more

effectively. Perfect.

Now I'm going to read it. I don't like to do that

anyway, before I interview somebody, I want to come in

cold, but that sounds like a book I could I could probably

read, because it's not all about the it's more about the mindset.

I like that. So how can my audience get hold of you? Find

your book. Find you

forging financial freedom. It's on Amazon and

available as a Kindle or hardback. Veritas alaska.com is

our website and on Instagram,

never even mentioned that you were in

Alaska. Oh, my goodness, that's right, yes.

Okay, Veritas Alaska, we work with people all

over but Veritas alaska.com is the website, and Veritas dot

Alaska on Instagram, and you can find me pretty easily on

LinkedIn. Just look up Chad Hufford Veritas, and I'll pop

right up.

Okay, sounds good. This was a pleasure. Thank

you so much for being here. And what have I got written here?

It's clear that true wealth isn't just about the size of

your bank account. It's about living in alignment with your

values, building strong relationships and creating a

life you love. And I know that that is a passion for you, I can

tell and thank you for sharing about your kids as well. I

appreciate that.

My pleasure. Thanks for letting me come on.

You're very well. Welcome.

There we go. So remember thank you to my

audience for being here. Please let me know if you enjoyed our

conversation and reach out to Chad for further conversation

about wealth and mindset around money, and remember to stay

connected and be remembered. You.