Interview with Mark Baker on financial literacy and life skills

Hello, I'm Julianne Good and this is Psych One-on-One. Welcome. Welcome. We are here to make psychology understandable, entertaining, and hopefully enlightening for you and your family and friends. Make your life a little bit easier. We're here to give you some tips on how to live better. And tonight my guest is in studio and his name is Mark Baker. He is going to speak about one of the books that he has written already, which is called Baker's Guide, The Chest Game of Life. And he's going to tell you a little bit about his background and we're going to launch into this interview right away. Hi, Mark. How are you doing? I'm good. How are you? Thanks for having me, Julianne. I really appreciate this. You're welcome. It's good to have you here. We had an interesting serendipitous meeting in a parking lot, believe it or not. I don't know how we got into the conversation, but we just started talking and Mark showed me his book. And I had read it within an afternoon. I was going, wow, this is some really good information. And I talked to him about being a guest on the show because he has written this book on making it out of lower socioeconomic situations, which I'm sure all of us have been in one time or another. I know I've had my financial struggles and I'm going through another round of it right now. But hey, life gets better. And you just keep going forward. Right, Mark? Exactly. So I guess I should start with, we met in the parking lot of a hospital because I'm in pharmaceutical sales. So my background is I went to medical school. Prior to that, I was at Stanford University. And you can read about my bio in the back of the book. I know we don't have a whole lot of time. So I really want to get into book one, tell a little bit about book two. But I'm just a humble guy from Louisville, Kentucky. And I had a lot of thoughts in my head. And I was like, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. I actually started doing some investing in property with a buddy of mine in Shreveport, Louisiana. And I'm like, I bought a house down there for $35,000. Wow. The mortgage was $325 a month. I'm like, and then I'm just thinking about all the mistakes and things I had done and made in life. And I'm like, what could I give back to the world? Or how could I give back to the world so that someone will not make those same mistakes like I did? And I guess I was thinking of my children. And just... Looking at the guys in the neighborhood, I'm like, you don't have to sell drugs. I live in Inglewood, by the way. I'm like, you don't have to be a derelict society to make it in America. I'm like, I know it's rough in LA. It may be harder in major cities. But if you move 30 to 40 miles outside of any major city, you will see pretty much cows. So Shreveport, Louisiana was a great awakening for me. Like, I could live here on minimum wage. It's a three bedroom, one bath, brick home in a decent area. It's not like, you know, it's not a rundown, dilapidated. It's a house that I purchased as an income property. And so I started doing the math. And I'm like, wait a minute. This is not possible. Like, you could work at McDonald's. Just think if you had a roommate. You could each have a room and an office and be paying $175 a month in rent. Or not rent, mortgage. And so then I'm thinking, well, do people even know the difference between mortgage and rent? Like, I know I didn't. My mom was an accountant. And she just didn't share a lot of information with me. Thinking, well, you went to Stanford. You know, don't you know this stuff already? It's like, yes, mom. I know. I've learned it over time. But it would have been nice if you had told me maybe earlier so I could have made different choices. And that's what I'm trying to do. I want the target audience is 18-year-old graduating high school seniors. And I just basically show them how they can make it into America on minimum wage if they start from zero. I know it's pretty incredible. And one of the chapters was you were breaking down everything into minute, you know, the rent, the electrical bill, the cell phone bill, the, you know, cable. Just the essentials. And I thought that was really fascinating. I mean, that's what I was really impressed with your book with that. It took survival skills and it came from so many different angles on it. And I loved that. I'm going, this is really usable information. And I love the way that you wrote it. You wrote it in street language and in places. And I was reading and going, okay, I understand this, you know. Yeah. You know, you have to kind of get into the heads of your target audience. Right. Where are they when they're at age 18? And it's so different now. I mean, there's so many 18-year-olds that are still living with their parents and will continue to live with their parents for a while. My 21-year-old has recently moved back with me because he can't make it on his own. He's at a $10 an hour job. And, you know, even though he's working 40 hours a week, it's hard. I mean, we're in Southern California. Right. Even if he... If he lived with a bunch of buddies, maybe they could barely make it. But, you know, in the neighborhood that we live in, rent is at least $1,600 a month for an apartment. Right. And that's why you have to go out. You have to read the book. It tells you move outside of a major city if you have to. It tells you to leave. Right. Exactly. Yes. It tells you to leave. But it doesn't tell you to leave without a plan, without an idea, without... You have to work six months at home to save the money for that first rent. I'm not sending you out in the world totally. You're blind. And so there's a couple of things that I want to point out about the book that are really important. One, delayed gratification. That's something that's not really taught since this is kind of a psychology program, right? Right. So that's when they bring up two psychological things. Delayed gratification. And that's something that's so important and it's vital to the book because it's going to take time. You're not... I'm not giving them a million dollars and saying, here, run with it. It's like, no, you're starting from zero and building up to a million dollars. And then the second thing I want to let them know about, if you have enough delayed gratification, start at 18 and you were able to invest what the government will allow you to invest, which is $5,500 a year into an individual retirement account. Because if you don't have a 401k at a job, you know, it's called an IRA. So you can go set up an IRA at 18 anywhere. Fidelity, Schwab, wherever. I don't know if I can say those names on... No, of course you can. Yeah. You're good. Okay. So, but you can go invest your money wherever. And if you put the maximum that the government will allow for 15 years straight, it pretty much gets you close to being a millionaire. If the returns are there, it could be a million dollars. So let's just say 20 years to play it safe. So 18, by the time you're 38, you could already have your nest egg, your retirement nest egg built. But who's thinking at 18 of that, who has that kind of delayed gratification at 18? Unless you're taught. Exactly. That's the thing. If someone had told me that, I know it wouldn't apply to everybody. But if someone had told me that with my personality, oh, that would have been my target. $458, which is $5,500 divided by 12. It's about... It's about $458 a month. That's what I would have been putting away every month into some, you know, gross stock mutual funds at Schwab and wherever. And yeah, just because I... If someone told me that, but I didn't have no clue, didn't have an idea about that at all. And that's what I want to get you to do. The delayed gratification aspect is you have... It takes time. There's a buffer of time to get the things that we want in general. Some things show up right away. Some things take time. But with this instant... This era that we're in of text messaging, Instagram, you know, everything is just internet. Everything is there now readily available. And kids' attention spans are getting shorter and shorter. And, you know, it's just... So anyway, so to build wealth sometimes takes... Most of the time takes time. There's those few... And the thing is what people we see at the end, we see the end result all the time. Of like the Bill Gates, the Dells. We don't see what they did years before working in the garage or at, you know, at home in their home, at their parents' home office in the basement. Building up to where we only see that finished product. Like a lot of entertainers. People don't understand. Out in Hollywood, yeah, there's a lot of entertainers. And it seems like they just blew up overnight. No. They were singing in some garage with some friends out there singing in some studio, like some small, simple studio like this for years before they made it. Exactly. Writing for other people, you know, doing their own thing. We just see the end result thinking, oh my goodness, I just heard about that guy last year. And all of a sudden he's like in all these movies and he's doing this, he's doing that. That was the time, the delayed gratification. The gratification aspect, we don't know about what's happening behind the scenes off the grid. Right. And I think the whole thing too is you have to have patience that you're going to be in, you're going to be in the ditches for a while and doing minimum wage jobs and doing jobs that you are not exactly passionate about, but just for survival's sake and saying, okay, well, this is temporary, but I need to have a goal ahead of me. And to be able to have it where you're passionate enough about that goal that you will sit there, you will work extra hard and you will hang in there just to get that goal, just to have that drive behind you. Because I think one of the things that I see now that's been happening in our society, especially with the economic downturn over the last few years, is that people are losing that kind of hope and that kind of faith. And they're just, they're trudging along water and hoping they're not going to drown, you know? And it's sad to see. It's, you know, trying to keep those dreams alive and instilled and trying to inspire people to keep going forward. That's why I really like this book. I think it's a very readable book. It's, and I love the pearls of wisdom in here. Those are called POWs, P-O-Ws, POWs. Because I'm hitting you with those. When I go out and do the motivational talk that's associated with the book, those are the things that I think are the most I originally had the motivation to talk for 45 minutes and I went over a lot of the POWs. I think I'm going to break it down and do fewer POWs and go more in depth so I can really talk more about them because I'd really hit the surface in the book on them because it's for an 18-year-old target audience and I don't want to lose them. I don't want to lose their attention. So yeah, like pick one and we can just kind of play with it a little bit. But yeah, those are my favorite little things too. And those are the little pearls of wisdom I try to give to my children. That's, you know, what I would have wanted someone to have given to me. Yeah, exactly. I've got it now, but I mean earlier when I was younger. Well, yeah. And the whole thing too, I think we're of a generation that our parents were just, you know, trying to achieve the American dream. And for their generation, a lot of that was obtainable because prices were cheaper. You had job security a lot of times. You could work for one company for 25, 30 years and retire and get your pension at the end, right? Both my parents did. One from Chevron, one from Ford. Yeah. That's what they did. They worked one company for, since I can remember as a child, and that's what they were, they retired from there. Yeah. But that's not how, like I've already switched jobs four or five times in the same industry, of course, but that's just, it's just different. Oh, I know. I know. I mean, I'm into my, geez, I forgot. I lost count. Somewhere between five and 10 careers. I'm somewhere, and I'm starting all over again. Yeah. I'm starting all over. And it's pretty amazing. I'm really excited about it because I've wanted to do psychology since I was a teen, and I had a lot of obstacles in my way and trying to get through and trying to just maintain, go to school, work minimum wage jobs, and be living out on my own. It was a struggle, you know, and then I was a single parent for a while later on, and that's another thing, you know. I mean, it's just, but it builds character. It builds character. You know, I mean, when you're going through it at the time, you're like, oh, I'm going to be here forever, but nothing is forever. Everything's temporary, you know, and you just learn from it and you build character. Now, this is one of the pearls of wisdom I like in here because I could really relate to this one. This is, it is smart to learn from your own mistakes, but wise to learn from the mistakes of others. That's one of my favorite ones too. Yeah. And so, I don't know where I heard that a long time ago, and I just really, that hit home to me, and it's like the difference between being smart and being wise. It's like you could get wiser faster by listening to other people. Like, it's the same thing a lot of the motivational speakers tell you. Like, if you want to learn how to do something, ask someone who's already done it, you know, because you're going to learn from their mistakes. They've already made the mistakes. You don't have to fall through the same pitfalls that they did, and I actually have like a number line illustration that I show to my children. I say, okay, Daddy had you at this age, and I knew to this much. I said, now you're this age, so now Daddy knows to this much, and you know to this much. It's like, look what Daddy, how much more Daddy knows. So, let me tell you what I know to get you here faster. You don't have to go through all the mistakes I made, but you're already, you've gained the knowledge and the wisdom, so you're here now. A lot of times people have to make their own mistakes and do what they have to do. I get it. I understand. Yeah. But I'm trying to allow them to move up the curve faster, and just think if we did that every generation, if we did that every generation, we should not be where we are right now anywhere in the world. Like the whole world should be light years ahead. Exactly. Yeah, and moving forward and progressing. Right. I think this is the thing that blows me away is that technologically, we're moving forward. We're advancing. It's, yeah, it's going faster than we can keep up with it as consumers, but I think relationship-wise, people are at a loss. You know, I had somebody, I had somebody that I talked to today, which is really, it was a good point. She said, you know, a lot of people like in their 18-year-old, 20-year-old and stuff, they're a lot of times when you talk to them, they're very, they don't have a lot of expression on their faces and stuff. Stoic. It's stoic, I guess you could say. Why? I don't know. I thought it was interesting though, and I'm thinking, well, because a lot of times their faces are down, and they're texting on their phone. They're locked in on their phones. They've been brought up to be locked in on some sort of screen or another. So should I talk to my children through FaceTime? Is that what you mean? Skype. Should I Skype and FaceTime my children? Is that how I talk to them? No, but I thought it was fascinating. I thought it was a good point though. So talk to us a little bit about your book. Okay. Well, the whole point of the book is for the nonprofit. The nonprofit, you were just talking like the way your life, you were talking about what you've been through in life and different career changes and single mom at a certain time. I actually wrote the book to plant, to set me up for the nonprofit, which is 2020 Living in Hindsight. And so the book is actually the guidebook for getting into the program, the nonprofit that I want to set up, which is a catchment. So think about 18 year old high school seniors when they graduate. There's not much you can really do in America. There's like basically three general things you can do. You can either get a job, and that means any job, or you can go to school and that means any school vocation. I mean from nursing school to their massage therapy to any school, you know, bartending school, it's a school. So that's just very broad terms. And then the third thing is basically military. Those are the three things you could basically do in America. I mean military is a combination of school and you're getting paid to do it too. So I want to set up a program called the Baker program where it's kind of a catchment. Say these kids they get pushed to go to college. The attrition rate is terrible, depending on its upwards of 50% depending on certain schools, but around 25% of kids don't make it from the first year to the second year and it falls off even more of that from the second year to the third year. So those kids now you've gone to college, you got some student loan debt and you still only have a high school diploma and your earning potential is where it is. Right and then you have that big debt on top of it. Yeah, exactly. And that's when I want you to go back home, read this book, follow the first six months, save your money and then come apply for the Baker program. And I want to have it set up on I'm going to go after grant money and I really would like philanthropic funding to and I'm going to buy four plexus because I've been the property game in the past. So I know what to do fix them up. I want them all the properties that look uniform. Say I have a fourplex in one part of town and a fourplex in another part of town. We'll do it in small towns to start with Twin Falls, Idaho Shreveport, Louisiana smaller. I mean even Spokane Washington me just different places and all they have to do is just follow the book to a tee for two to three years and let's get your life get you ready. Yeah. Yeah. You may be like 18 years old. Some people are not ready for college. Some are if you're not that's fine. You may be ready at 21 22 years. Mean you just maybe need to mature a little bit and live life work the jobs. You don't want to work. So, you know what you don't want to do. It's which helps you focus for what you do want to do but persevere through it. And that's what the book teaches you delay gratification, you know learn from others mistakes, you know, there's just a lot like this is the difference between rent and the mortgage. Okay, let's rent now, but we're going to get a mortgage soon. I talked about all that like that's in the book how to be a millionaire, you know in 15 years, which is you know, if you invest your money right this amount of money and these growth stock mutual funds over this amount of time. It gets you really close to being a millionaire. It's that's the really the easiest way to be a millionaire, you know kind of worry and stress free just keep putting your money in this compound interest. Keep putting your money into this IRA and the rate of returns from the stock market S&P 500 over 20 years is about 8 to 11% just depending on the year. You're going to get your, you it's pretty much guaranteed. It's not a gambling. You're pretty pretty much guaranteed. So right is just getting into that discipline when you're 18 years old is, you know, I think I think that's going to be a little bit rough. But again, it's it's your surroundings. Are your parents going to support this family friends, you know saying, you know, let's let's go do this don't and especially if the parents aren't doing so well, economically, and stuff. I, you know, my whole thing is and I told my son this too. I said, look how much I've struggled. Don't do the same thing. I want you to go get your college degree before you're 25. He's going back to college again. Now. Now he's going for something that he's really passionate about and I said, that's great. That's just stick it out and stuff because you see me. I've gone through struggles because I've had to go back to school and I just finished my master's in clinical psychology and December. That was five straight years of school. Congratulations. Thank you. It was awesome, but it was also really really hard work. I would like to reach out to the listeners. If you would like to join Mark Baker and myself in this conversation. The number is 800-893-9562. Again, that's 800-893-9562. Now I'm going to go back to the book. I love this. And one of the phrases here and I love that there's certain senses that just jumped out at me. Which is wonderful. I think when especially when you're trying to target 18 year old sometimes that might you know, light a spark hopefully turning into a fire, but it's like school gives you the basis of structure in your life home. My maybe chaotic and I've you know, a lot of times and I've worked with with people in a domestic violence shelter who come from very chaotic households and trying to keep them. You know going and stuff and getting back to school and some of the women that I've talked to I've recommend to go back to school or if they are in school keep going to school because you're not only are you going to benefit your economic situation. You're going to strengthen your family and you are going to teach your children some really valuable lessons period. Right? See that's what the program would do. I would take them from their environment put them in our environment. So to speak which if they're in a fourplex inside the Baker program, they're there for reason. We've already we sat down and got a game plan. If you qualified to get into this was a game plan of okay, what are we doing with your life over the next two to three years and you've got us pulling for you and it takes a little bit of the worry out. It'll be the the rental be on sliding scale based on your jobs, which you make so you're not stressed out about that your budget. We set up a budget for you. So we can kind of help out with all that. It's the issue is yes the stuff from before you get to the Baker program at home. I really you know, what can I do for that? I don't really know. I'm hoping that they'll come here. They'll learn they'll be smart to be stronger and they'll be able to stand on their own two feet and then maybe reach back and help another like I really I could not put a picture in this book that I died to put in here. I called the artist and everything. It's a picture of like it looks like two slaves running away and one is over the fence or over the wall reaching back trying to help pull up another one and the caption says he ain't so heavy and I really want to put that picture in the book at the end of the book. Because we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we we and that looks normal. I mean, from the outside world, it looks really dysfunctional, but for you, that's normal. And trying to pull yourself out of that and saying, I can do better for myself. It's going and finding those people who can inspire you, whoever they may be. If it's not your household that you grew up in, maybe it's a teacher or a minister or a family friend or something that can sit there and look at you and know that you're a worthy person and know that you can do better and see that spark of life and light in you and inspire that to grow. I had that happen with me. I've had wonderful, beautiful people along my journey and it's been great. And a lot of times I don't even remember. I mean, sometimes it's just somebody I meet spontaneously, like meeting you in the parking lot. I mean, that was, like I said, serendipitous. And it was just wonderful. And, you know, just to, you know, keep that, the fires going of inspiration, I think is so important. I think we all need to look for mentors in our life, wherever we can find them. That's the whole point of the, it's wise to learn from the mistakes of others. I actually talk about that in my talk, the talk I give at the schools. And I talk about, you know, I just tell them the same thing I said earlier is that if you want to be a teacher, go ask a teacher how she became a teacher. He became a teacher or professor or whatever. You know, if there's something that you are passionate about and you want to do, go find someone that does that and ask them. I just feel that, you know, at home and some of the impoverished areas, they're just, like you said, they're so worried about the chaos and taking care of all this stuff. And if you have a bunch of kids, it's hard to focus on one. And it's just, if you're trying to pay the bills and make, you know, make the ends meet, it's hard to coach and counsel. And especially it's the concept of the 32-year-old grandmother. I hate to break it. I don't want to bring that up, but a 16-year-old having a baby and then their 16-year-old having a baby. You're 32 and you have a grandmother already. It's like, what did you know at 16 to raise a child? Now, and at 32, I'm still thinking what little I knew at 32. And now you got a grandchild and you have a 16-year-old. It's just, it's a perpetuating cycle that I'm trying, that's what I'm trying to break. That's why the target audience is 18-year-olds. You know, when they graduate, I want to go further back. But when you go further back, you have to start getting the child labor laws and all this stuff. But if they're 18, they're full-fledged adults and I can handle them as an adult. So when they move into the properties, they sign a lease like a normal adult. And it's like, I can evict them like an adult. You know, it takes away some of the drama a little bit on my, from my perspective. Plus they're 18, they're adults and I can expect more of them. They can't use that excuse as well. I'm just a kid. And I'm just like, well, in our society, you can vote for who's president. So, you know, in this space, if you come in, if you're over 21, I'm really going to be looking at you like you really have an adult brain. So we really need to be, you know, adult-like. Right. And responsible. That's the whole thing. Hey, I, you know, when I was 17, I graduated, I moved a hundred miles away from my hometown to start a technical school down in the Southern part of Wisconsin. And I was 17. I had my own lease. I had my own apartment and it was scary as hell. It was just like, are you kidding? But it was exciting to, it's like, I've got freedom now. Now I can sit here and think my own thoughts. I can read whatever I want. I can listen to whatever records I wanted because I had records at the time. Okay. So we won't tell my age, but I have records in the garage too. I thought I was going to get some money for them, but I don't think so. Nothing like vinyl, right? But no, I mean, it was exciting, but it was also really terrifying because it's like, okay, I'm living off of student loans. I had a couple of part-time jobs. And just coming up with the concept, okay, I'm an adult now. I need to take care of me and I need to take care of school and my responsibilities at work. And, you know, luckily I had, you know, I had been working since age 10, you know, picking up, you know, babysitting jobs and all this other stuff, but, you know, getting that responsibility thing. And I think that's so important. And a lot of times nowadays, kids don't have that opportunity to pick up. Like, like side jobs and stuff, you know, or, you know, and maybe that needs to come back. So they start getting used to, okay, I'm, you know, working a job. I've got my own money to spend. I can spend it on whatever and start instilling those kinds of responsibilities again, versus, you know, well, if anything, you can come back and live with mom and dad and live with, you know, I mean, it's really tough nowadays. It's just, you know, picking up those odd jobs and stuff because it's just- That's so different. That's the kind of thing that I would target for the audience before 18. Yeah. And I would say, especially in smaller towns, it's like, you know, instill some kind of work ethic entrepreneurial aspect to these kids, you know, you know, shovel snow, rake leaves, whatever it is, even if you just did two or three houses on your street, yours and the house next to your, each of your houses, if they didn't have kids or who, someone already do it, or the old person, the older elderly person on the street, go rake their leaves and do their driveway. I mean, something, one other thing outside of your own house responsibilities, you know, and that if, but the parents have to have the wherewithal to tell the kids to go do, they're not going to necessarily go do that on their own. You and I are different minded, you know, you've got your masters and you know, it took you some time, but you did it. It says something about who you are. You did, you know, it's something from within you driving you like 17 out on your own. A lot of kids aren't ready for that, you know, it's like, so that's why the book is moreso for those who need a hand, you know, who you feel need help. Like, I'd rather adults read it first and then they know who they should give it to. Right. You know, and then even some adults could take some of the information for themselves and utilize it because they, a lot of, some adults don't know. Friends of mine have read and they're like, okay, I learned a thing or two. I did too. Definitely the financial stuff I need to be aware of. And I actually have learned more since then. And I'm, you know, I'm writing a book about relationships. That's the next book. Mm-hmm. And there's, I have a feeling I'm going to have to redo this one a little more in depth, especially once the program gets going. And I've got some newfound knowledge about things like, I mean, we, I just want to encourage everybody, just save 10% of everything you earn right now. I'm talking about if you have to hide it in your sock, in your top drawer of your house, I don't care where you do, what you do, just start saving 10% of everything you earn. And folks don't think that they can make it on the 90% that's left because they feel like they're living from check to check already. Right. And you're, you'll, you'll give up that whatever it was, lunch you were going to eat that week out, you know, at lunchtime, you'll make your own lunch that week or that day or whatever. You'll find it. 10% is so easy to find. Well, and then there's a lot of banks too, that they will set that up for you. They, if you have direct deposit or, you know, deposit your check or whatever, they'll take out whatever amount you specify and put it into a savings account. And then maybe if, if you don't completely trust yourself, then have a co-signer that says, you know, I'm going to take this money, I'm going to put it in my savings account. And then maybe if, if you don't completely trust yourself, then have a co-signer that says, you know, I'm going to take this money, I'm going to put it in my savings account. And then maybe if, if you don't completely trust yourself, then have a co-signer that says, okay, I can't take out this money unless this other person comes in. So you're held accountable. I want to kind of like digress and say, no, do it yourself because of who it will make you out to be. It's true. It's you working your muscle. Don't let- Okay. That's still- someone else can not do your push-ups for you to build your chest. It just doesn't work that way. You gotta do it yourself. And that's why- and I want the money accessible so that you have to engage your will to not go- go and touch it. That's the whole point of the process. It's a part of the process to not let the bank do it. No, you need to take 10% cash and go put it somewhere and hide it. Now, when it starts building up and getting to a significant amount, of course, yeah, then maybe put it in the bank or somewhere in a safe deposit box or in a safe, but still you go do it and you do it. So it's the physical point of doing it, right? And the will of knowing that it's there, but I'm not going to touch it. That's what strengthens you. It's not what you just said just gave some easy. Well, yeah, because you have to have plan B. I know. Well, you know what? Let's talk a little bit more about the book, about building up willpower to get yourself at a launching point as being a young adult. We're going to take a commercial break right now, and we'll be right back. We'll be right back with Psych 101 with Mark Baker. The Chicago School of Professional Psychology offers numerous psychology, behavioral, and health-related science graduate degrees at three campuses, Los Angeles, California, including branches in Westwood and Irvine, Chicago, Illinois, and Washington, D.C., and online. The Chicago School prepares students to meet the ever-changing mental health needs of society through classroom experience. And real-world training. The Chicago School Counseling Centers in Irvine and Westwood provide caring, confidential, and affordable psychological services to individuals and their families. For more information, visit thechicagoschool.edu. And thank you to the Chicago School of Professional Psychology for sponsoring Psych 101. We are back with Mark Baker. We are talking about his book, Baker's Guide, The Chess Game of Law. And we're going to talk about the life of a child. And why don't you tell us a little bit about these talks that you give at some of the schools. Okay. So I found out that my target audience is probably the continuation high schools, where it's the adult, you know, they're, well, they're not really adult. Well, they are. They're over 18, some of them, most of them. But they could be the 15, 16, 17-year-olds, the females who are pregnant, and they don't want, like, the local schools, they don't want them, the public school doesn't want them. They don't want them there with the rest of the population. So they go to the adult school or the continuing education school. And, or they're, like, 19 years old. They've been held back a few times, and now they're 19 in the 11th or 10th or 11th grade. You know, that's kind of inappropriate with a lot of 14, 15, 16-year-olds, and you're 19, you know what I mean, or 20, you know, or about to be 20. So a lot of times it's that, or they've just been in so much trouble, they just don't work at the public school. So anyway, so that's a good target audience, because those are the ones that have the at-home issues and socioeconomically, you know, deprived a little. And they just really gravitate. When I go in there and I talk to the principal and I show them the outline of what I'm going to talk about, and they see the book, they're like, yeah, yeah, you get in here. So they brought me in. I've done it in Sacramento and at Seattle and Salt Lake City, a couple, like, schools in those three different locations. And so I go in, I just kind of go a little bit more, more in-depth about the pearls of wisdom. I pull, like, nine out of here and talk five minutes on each, which makes it talk about 45 minutes. And then I give 10 to 15 minutes of question and answer. Well, maybe five minutes at the beginning about myself and then 10 minutes of question and answer at the end. And so I just go into each pearl of wisdom and just kind of talk about, like, one pearl of wisdom in here. Oh, that's the one we just have. Focus on long-term gains that have staying power. Learn to have, know, and understand delayed gratification. So I talk to them about, how, you know, how long did it take to send a letter, like, 200, 300 years ago? You know, it was like, if you wanted to go across the ocean, it was months. If you wanted to go across the country, it was days or, you know, weeks. You know, it's not like today, you're just texting your phone and somebody gets it instantaneously. So I talk to them about, you know, that I'm setting them up for you have to have, be able to have staying power and to take your time and slowly build, you know, everything doesn't come right away like you may think it does, like on TV. And I'll talk about pearl of wisdom, about if you sacrifice and eat hamburger meat today, your whole family will be able to eat filet mignon tomorrow. Yeah, that's great. So if you just save a little bit, you know, save a little bit now, the 10% concept, if you save it now, you know, you know you can't, with saving the 10% now, it may take away from your ability to buy that steak today. You could have used the 10% to buy the steak, but no, you hold off and hold off and hold off. Now you can eat filet mignon all the time or whenever you want. Because you've got a nest egg built up. You've got your savings. You, you know, your bills are all taken care of. You're, you don't owe anybody anything. You don't have any debt. You know, the concept that Dave Ramsey talks about all the time that the debtor is slave, you know, slave to the lender. So, and that's a big thing for me to tell the kids, don't fall into that trap. Well, and that's the whole thing too, about pulling back from being materialistic in this society. Because we are bred to be content. We are consumers in this country, period. I mean, you just, anytime you watch TV, here comes another commercial, buy, buy, buy, you know, and they get down to your emotional core a lot of times, especially the good commercials. It's like, okay, I need to go out and get A, B and C so I can feel like I'm, you know, something or worthy. You know, I mean, it's just people have to understand to pull themselves away from that. I can talk about that in the book, conservative. I can talk about that in the book, conservative consumerism. Yeah. I say that, I mentioned that phrase and it's like, don't follow the herd aspect, you know, about materialism. You know, be your own person, do your own thing, live. And I try to, I teach them two things I talk about. Knowledge, I say is knowledge, knowledge is power. Everyone hears that and knows that. I'm like, not really. I said, knowledge is only powerful when applied and utilized appropriately. Otherwise it's just knowledge. So what you know? It's just words otherwise, right? Thank you. People, people like, people know how to lose weight, but we still have an obesity epidemic. Big time. Yeah. I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to go there, but I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, but the bottom, you know, that kind of thing. And then I also talk about live within your means. And I say, and I ask the kids about that. Do they understand what that means? And, you know, and they kind of give me some ideas or they tell me and I'm like, really? It's not the way to live. Like, well, unless you take it really literally, you should live just within your means. Cause if you live within, most of the time what people means of living within your means is, you know, only spend what you have. Don't spend over what you have. But that's like basically living to your means or at your means. And that there's nothing left over. And that's not how you're supposed to, you really should live below your means. So there is some leftover to save for either a rainy day or just to save for your retirement or to save for your next vacation. You have to learn to live way below your means, not within your means, not at your means or not to your means. This is the kind of stuff I talk about. Cause like the book is written so that you can put this in your, it's a four, like pretty much four by four, put in your back pocket. That's what I want kids to do. Put it in your back pocket, take it with them on the school bus. No excuses for not being able to read. It takes about an hour for an adult to read. I'm sure it takes a little more than an hour for an 18 year old to read. I mean, I wrote it very surface so that when I go in and give the talk, they can either ask me more questions. You know, the goal is eventually to have a blog set up when I have some time and start really getting, I guess, go ahead and succumb to Instagram and Twitter and Facebook and all that. You know, and really go in full bore with the book and out there doing the speaking engagements. Well, I think one of the important questions to ask is how much do you really need to be happy? And how much do you really need to be satisfied? Because every time you go out and buy something that you figure that you have to have to have, you have to question how much maintenance time do I have to put into this? You have to clean it or wash it or make sure that you have that it's safe or, I mean, you're putting so much energy into this product that you've bought. And you have to ask yourself, is it going to be worth putting that much time and effort into something? Or is it going to just, I have to have it today and then tomorrow it's going to be all dusty and I'm going to put it aside and something else, some new toy is going to interest me. I need to go get that. I think that's where a lot of people in this country end up getting into financial debt because it's driven, driven into our brains. And again, you have to ask yourself, do I really actually need this? Now, if anybody in the audience would like to join Mark Baker and myself, it is 800-893-9562. So let's get back to the book. Now, what drove you initially to write this book in the first place? Because from your background, it didn't look like you had any kind of, you know, literary kind of knowledge. I mean, you know, everybody goes through the educational process, but not everybody ends up to be a writer afterwards. How did that happen to you? That's really funny. I hated English. Back in high school, even though I had two really good English teachers, one was Miss Hanson. I'll never forget her. She was a really good English teacher. But what happened was I was leaving work. I mean, leaving home to go to work every day. And there was these like, you know, same five guys kind of hanging out all the time on my street, so to speak. And it's funny, they're not even there anymore. I don't know what happened to them, but it's like it just seemed like I go to work and I come home and you're still here. I go to work and I come home and you're still here. It's like you don't look thin. You know, it's like, what are you doing all day long, every day? Like, what are y'all doing? Like, just hanging out. And which city was this? This is here in Inglewood. OK. And so I'm just like, OK, well, let me just. I said, and then when I started buying the property in Shreveport and putting two and two together, I was like, those guys, they're I'm sure they're probably selling drugs or something of that nature. And I'm like, they don't have to be doing that. Like, you can make it if all five of y'all went and bought a house in Culver City, a three bedroom or four bedroom house, and everyone shared a room or did something or whatever, you know, put your money together, they probably could, you know, all work at McDonald's. Just OK. That's five guys working minimum wage. If I really sat down here and did the math, they're probably bringing in three to $4,000 a month, you know, together, five of them. It's you could pay a mortgage of 18, $2,500 mortgage easily with that. I mean, if I really sat under the numbers and a couple of them got a part time job or got girlfriends or wives and, you know, yeah, it's going to be a little crowded for a little while, but it's better than being a derelict society and not paying taxes and just, you know, where's your life? You know, run, dodge and bullets and do you know, it's like and running from the law. It's like, you know, there's so much. I just don't understand that there's the benefit risk just doesn't seem to be. And I've actually there's a book and I can't think of the name of it right now to save my life. There's a book that actually breaks down how much drug dealers actually make. It's about minimum wage or less serious for the time that they put in. There's only a few that are at the top that make the big bucks, most of them. The ones. On the ground like that we see every day selling, you know, like, you know, enough to roll a joint. I mean, or whatever, like a little nickel bag, dime bag here and there. When they break it down to how many hours a week they're working and then they don't have there's no insurance and there's no assurance. Yeah. And a huge risk. Right. And then they're also doing something that's detrimental to society. But anyway, so that's the whole point of the book is like, if I could get this book into enough hands, there's 18, there's about 4 million 18 year olds. In America every year about. And I just want to give it get it to 100,000 hands, you know, and just let them are just just to start the shift, the paradigm of thinking. And that's my goal is eventually to shift the paradigm of thinking of the plan to get back to why I wrote the book. It's to stop that this, you know, maybe to stop some of the nonsense. It's like you really think you're making more money? Not really. And it's not as glorious as as like. Yeah. Yeah. YouTube and Hollywood in certain aspects, you know, pretends that it is and stuff. I think that's that whole glamorization of dealing. And yeah, it's horrible. Of course, they're only showing the people that are at the top and they're getting away with it. And yeah, that's not reality. That's why this book that some guy wrote, I wish I got to go get the information. Someone told me about it and I wrote it down and I have it in my list of books to read at home. And so it just came to mind here. Yeah. I'm like, are you serious? They're only making minimum wage. Are less to do that. Yeah. To sell marijuana. It's like, no. And like, well, now things are changing and it gets legal. I thought it should be legalized a long time ago so we can get paid, get taxes paid. I mean, cigarettes. Well, it looks like it's starting to go that way in Colorado and Washington. So we'll see what happens. So yeah. So as we're starting to wrap up, can you tell us a little bit about the next book that you're writing on relationships? Yes. Okay. So this book prompted me, OK, this is about money and I'm thinking, oh, I'm going to do this. Oh, gosh, I have a lot of opinions about relationships, too, since I've been in them. Mistakes made. I've been married, actually separated, going through divorce now. And that's OK. Just it is what it is. I think I had to do that to learn what I needed to learn to be able to do what I need, what I've been purposed to do, which is to shift the paradigm of thinking. And the relationship book is I have this formula. I'm trying to figure out the math and get it exactly right. But. And I know everything's not just a numbers game when it comes to relationships. Because there's a lot of areas of gray. But the bottom line is 80 20 in sales. We're 80 20 in relationship. If you and compatibility is the word everyone thinks love, love, love, love, love, love is important. But love is not the glue that holds you together day to day, day to day. Love is the glue that holds you together when times get rough. Love is the thing that holds you through longevity over time. But the day to day is about compatibility. And then people don't really seem to understand is compatibility is not. Oh, you like to travel? Yes. Oh, I love to travel to know. I like to go to the beach and you like to go to the snow in the mountains. That's not compatibility. Just because you both like to travel, you got to go down a layer, a couple of layers and kind of try to figure each other out. And I just I know that it can work when you're very different. It just it's a lot simpler, a lot easier. And I know that I've learned that by the person being different is because they're to grow you as a person who you are. But most people don't really get that. They're always trying to change. The other person's or the divorce rate is over 60%. It's like the perspective is off. The the dynamic of the relationships are just off. And so that's kind of what I wanted to shed a light on and give a practical like this book is just a practical how to. And if someone just follows what the book says to a T, their life could probably would work out OK financially. Same thing with the relationship book. I'm going to try to make it very simple, like figure out where you are on this 80 20 thing or is your 70 30. We're compatible 70%. There's 30% that's not compatible. OK, are there any non-negotiable? Are there any real non-negotiables like, OK, that I cannot deal with? OK, then don't even start the relationship with that person. You know, if you already have your deal breakers knowing up front, know yourself. And that's why the book is going to be titled Baker's Guide to Relationships to Thine Own Self Be True. Like in this book, I have, you know, Baker's Guide to the Chess Game of Life, a different roadmap to success. It's going to be the same thing. Baker's Guide to Relationships to Thine Own Self Be True. And that's the thing. You've got to know yourself and being in relationship is about yourself. It's not about the other person. And the thing is, once you know what you like and what you want, then you can share that with the other person. And that other person hopefully will what should be like a kind of a reflection or a mirror of what? OK, yes, I like that's what I like. So that's why I chose you or you are doing all the things that I like without me having to tell you because you're just who you are. I allow you to be who you are. And that's the biggest thing. That is a big thing. Just not expecting somebody to change because you're uncomfortable with it. I mean, that's it's really important. And I think and I know me as a woman, we have a tendency as a gender to sit there and say, oh, but I really want to change him. And I thought that he would do this and he would change like that. And, you know, and it just doesn't work out. And you have to just take a step back and go, OK. And like you said, it's. The lesson is for you. The female to be in a place of acceptance and compassion because the universe is held together. The glue that holds the universe together, the universe together is compassion. It is so great for you to have compassion for yourself to say, OK, stop that. I need to allow him to be who he is and I like it or I don't. Right. I can live with it or I can't. Right. And then if you can't get off, get out of it. That's right. In a relationship, please. Right. And that's what love is about. Love will hold you in. And I'll hang in there when it's like, OK, I don't really like that, but I like him enough. I love I love him enough to stay, you know. Yeah. I see the good traits in him or her. Exactly. You have to you have to do that, you know. So that sounds like it's going to be an interesting book. Now, when is that due for publishing? Maybe like next November is what I'm shooting for that. This one came out in a November timeframe to about a year or so ago. But that's November seems like my. My time to get it really finished and wrapped up. I'm just only got like the first chapter, but I have so much in my head and I'm trying to figure out how to word it. And I don't want to be too wordy. It's a lot. Right. Putting it together. Oh, yeah. And on top of it, you're going through your own process. So, yeah, which, you know, may may add or distract from the book. So a little. Yeah. So I have compassion for you for going through that. I'm also divorced and it's a really, really tough process. So, yeah. So. And. And I'm also divorced. And it's a really, really tough process. So, yeah. And. And. If anybody would like to contact you or get one of your books, how can they do so? Oh, yeah. There's the website, of course. Www.Baker's Guide to that's B.A.K.E.R.S. G.U.I.D.E.T.O. Dot com. And there's, of course, a PayPal link on there. If I just click on the PayPal link and I'll send you a book right out. Or you can go to Acacia publishing dot com. That's my publishing. Who published the book? Www. www.acaciaciapublishing.com, all one word. And then of course on Amazon and on Kindle, you can download it on Kindle too. Okay, and it's 7.95, correct? Yes, 7.95. I mean, it's a great 7.95. It's a good investment. You can do it. Thanks. Yeah, definitely. So what else would you like to add that you haven't gone through yet with any of your books? I just really want the world to be better in general. And the way for us to do that is to, we've got to not be so selfish and self-centered. Like capitalism teaches you to rise to the top of the pyramid. Well, at the top of a pyramid is a point and only one person can stand up there. And that's the biggest issue with capitalism. And it's this drive that we all are driven to do our own thing and it makes us selfish. And so... So we got it. Same way in traffic. It's like, I don't understand. We can't learn. We can't merge. We still can't merge yet. We've been driving how long? And it's a zipper. You go, I go. You go, I go. You go. It's like the teeth of a zipper. If I could just teach someone that. Baggage claim is pretty bad too at the airport. I have a whole skit about that too. But it's like, I just, I step back and just pay attention to all this and I just take a deep breath and I just keep imagining us all getting along one day. Yeah. Patience and compassion. Right. And understanding. Right. And you're right. Not sitting there and having tunnel vision to what's going on around us. Because I think that I can see that happening and in certain circumstances. And I'm just like, you're right. They just need to step back, take a deep breath and just understand that we're in this together. Right. Yeah. We're not on the top of the pyramid by ourselves. It's pretty lonely up there, really, honestly. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. So thank you so much, Mark, for being my guest. Thank you for having me. I really appreciate this opportunity. Thank you. Thank you. And if you would like to download this later, this is on iTunes Store under podcast, under Psych 101, and that's P-S-Y-C-H, the number one. Oh, and another number one. You can download things for free there and you can also take it from our archives at skidrowstudio.com. I would love to thank my board op, Jenny Guzman. She's awesome. And our wonderful executive producer, Jeremy Hansen, for allowing us to broadcast what we want to because we are not obligated to any big corporate corporation. It's wonderful. I love it. And yeah. So please. Please join us weekly, Monday from seven to eight Pacific Standard Time. We are here to make psychology understandable and hopefully to help you out. So this is Julianne Good for Psych 101. Take care of yourself. Take care of each other. Bye now. Bye now. Bye now. Bye now. Bye now. Bye now. Bye now. Bye now.