Rebuilding My Personal Finance Stack + The Best Psychology Book I've Ever Read
What I'm Up To (Socializing), What I Reflected On (The Best Psychology Book I've Read), and What's Occupying My Mind (Rebuilding my Finance Stack - all part of Allen's Friday Flights
Welcome to my Friday Flights!
It’s January 20. It’s almost Chinese New Year (January 22, you’re welcome), and we’ll be ushering in the year of the Rabbit. Don’t ask me what animal it is right now. Enjoy this collection of updates and tidbits for yours truly.
Cheers!
Past Publications
What I’m Up To
TL;DR: Too much socialization.
The Things
SO MUCH RAIN WHAT IS THIS
I’m on Day 20 of Ship 30 for 30 - which means I’ve published 20 atomic essays on LinkedIn; you can see it through my Typeshare, which is the writers tool I use to publish to multiple social medias, get prompts, and queue content.
Bowl Thai is the stupidest name for what is a great Thai restaurant that’s more traditional Hawaiian than it is Thai - Get their best seller Chicken or Tilapia.
I met up with a number of folks in person, all separately, and was quite wired on Boba. Hi Lolo, Christine, and Stanley!
DO YOU NEED YOUR TAXES DONE? And you also have an S-CORP / LLC / Partnership / Real-Estate? I know some folks for you.
There’s a Korean Karaoke place that is in the same plaza as a 99 cent store and Tesla Super Charger. IDK, it’s weird but I went to it and their fries are like McDs.
Honda-Ya is such a sold izakaya but it has a 2 hour wait.
I picked up Uncharted 4 for Steam Deck. It’s promising.
Using the power of a 3070 TI and NVIDIA’s NVENC, plus Handbrake, I’ve been able to shrink my media & raw footage library 62% without losing quality. Data hoarders, this one is for you.
My 5700x (the brain on my main PC) is currently…auto-overclocking itself and giving itself more performance while reducing energy needed. By the time you read this, it will be on the 9th hour of its task. My, how technology has evolved.
I’m on a mission to re-learn what I know and don’t know about finance, starting with with personal finance. See the ending piece for more details.
What I Reflected On
TL;DR: This Individual Psychology means a lot more than I previously thought.
This Is The Best Psychology Book I've Read
There are a lot of books about Psychology. A LOT.
And I've read most of them.
But during the beginning of my career break, I found the best psychology book that helped me through it all:
"The Courage to be Disliked" by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga.
For a few reasons:
Reason #1: This introduces Adlerian Individual Psychology - and is 100% the opposite from traditional Freudian Psychology which is what you commonly see, and even unconsciously learned today.
Reason #2: It focuses on self-determination and individual choice. Your your past experiences do not innately mean anything unless you decide and choose to give it meaning.
Reason #3: It will teach you how to view individuals and problems. All problems are matters of interpersonal relationships, and understanding someone's degree or relationship to an issue will explain why they act as they do.
Reason #4: You'll learn how to identify people's true goals, and their intentions behind those goals, and in many ways, how counter intuitive a person's true goals are to the action they want to take.
Reason #5: You'll learn that an individual's superiority complex is the same as an inferiority complex, and individuals tend to choose to be defined by either complexes in whatever action or field instead of taking a third option which is to ignore and move forward from them.
If you are at all interested in Individual Psychology, and even what you want to do in your next career, I can't recommend this book enough.
The above is what got posted to LinkedIn. The below is the addendum for everyone that follows this newsletter. I’ve had a lot of people reach out on the LinkedIn post, so here’s an expansion on that.
Around this time last year, I had picked up a book called “The Courage to be Disliked”.
Truth be told, I picked it up as it was a recommended reddit audible choice regarding philosophy and psychology. I was apprehensive to the title, but a short sample into it got me to go get it. I had enough built up audible credit to get me going.
It has become the defacto most influential book of 2022 for me.
It’s up there with Tuesdays with Morrie for me in terms of reframing how I go about my day to day behaviors.
What it does well is that it’s less of a lesson, or a “tell you how to do it”, and more of a realization that comes from maturity. It’s not a book that makes sense if you are in the infancy of your first job, but it ages like wine if you’re in your 2nd, or even 3rd (or after the age of 25).
Something that took me a while to grasp is this:
An event or action can happen
Your response or interpretation of it, is completely separate from said action.
You choose how you want to respond, and how you respond is based on your goals. Your goals can be interwoven for conflict avoidance, or power plays, and your actions are a reflection and extension of those inner goals.
You give meaning, your past does not inherently amount to anything, unless you assign meaning.
That is core of Adlerian Psychology - Individual Self Determining Psychology.
Who is this for?
This book is for that Asian American Work-Identity Driven individual who finds themselves working a lot, routinely picking up new skills all the time, finds themselves volunteering for things too, and believes they have had an impact.
Do you want it?
I’ll gift you a copy in exchange for a conversation with you after you read it.
What’s On My Mind
TL;DR: Rebuilding my Finance Stack
Rebuilding my Finance Stack
I’m in my 30s now (that’s the most 30ish thing to say) and I want to use the wisdom of my last 10 years of antics and shenanigans to revisit my relationship with finance at a personal level.
The first time I learned about personal finance, I went on a deep mission to pay off all my student debts that I had take for all 4 years at a State School (not as expensive!) - something I achieved by year 4 out of college. Now that I understand the principles of cashflow and the significance of interest, I’m taking this year to deepen my relationship with my own personal finance.
How?
I want to write atomic (precise) content around what I’m learning and bounce off you, the person who isn’t asking for this advice. What kind of content? Um, here’s an example:
Okay this is just one of those excited texts I create and send to people to succinctly demonstrate the atomic thought. You can expect this on LinkedIn at some point.
To elaborate more on the subject matter at hand:
The difference between a traditional bank savings account versus an independent high yield savings account
Traditional - 0.01% interest rate paid to you
High Yield Savings - 3.5%-5% interest rate paid to you
Example
Let’s say you had $5k to start.
You plan to open a savings account.
You plan to save $500 per month for 20 years
Let’s assume interest is paid to you monthly (it is) based on the ending balance in your account.
By Year 5
Traditional (0.01%)
Your Contributions to Date: $35,000
Interest: $10.13
Your Net: $35,010.13
High Yield Savings (3.5%)
Your Contributions to Date: $35,000
Interest: $3,720
Your Net: $38,720
By Year 10
Traditional (0.01%)
Your Contributions to Date: $65,000
Interest: $35.26
Your Net: $65,035.26
High Yield Savings (3.5%)
Your Contributions to Date: $65,000
Interest: $13,768
Your Net: 78,768.79
By Year 15
Traditional (0.01%)
Your Contributions to Date: $95,000
Interest: $75.41
Your Net: 95,075.41
High Yield Savings (3.5%)
Your Contributions to Date: $95,000
Interest: $31,334.18
Your Net: 126,334.18
By Year 20
Traditional (0.01%)
Your Contributions to Date: $125,000
Interest: $130.58
Your Net: $125,130.58
High Yield Savings (3.5%)
Your Contributions to Date: $125,000
Interest: $57,826.94
Your Net: $182,826.94
Summary:
Traditional @ 0.01% = $130.58 in interest gained over 20 years. (Source)
High Yield Savings @ 3.5% = $57,826.94 in interest gained over 20 years , or a 46% more than what you put in - and this is on top of your principle. (Source)
Well, that speaks for itself. Anyone have any high interest saving accounts they want to refer me into? Thinking about Marcus.
Anyway, I’m on a mission to re-learn finance again using the lens of appreciation that comes with age. High School and College me would have had zero understanding of this.
I have also picked up 4 books:
The Psychology of Money (Anthropological Approach)
Rich Dad Poor Dad (Aspirational Approach)
I Will Teach You to Be Rich (Actionable Approach)
The Changing World Order (Analytical Approach)
What else do you think I should read? Those will surface in this newsletter this year.
If you have anything you’d like to share, contradict, or blow my mind off - do shoot me a text or a message!
I’d like to learn.