Episode four forty, How contentment leads to better spending with Shannon Ables.
Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to save money, embrace simplicity, and liver your life. Here your hosts Jen and Jill.
Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast. My name is Jen, my name is Jill, And today we are talking with the simple sophisticate Shannon Abels about how contentment impacts our spending but really honestly like giving a framework for how to make better spending decisions on the small stuff, the things that aren't like automatically tied to your higher values, those day to day decisions. And I loved this conversation.
I'm just putting this together now post conversation with Shannon that it's the better alternative to little treats, just kind of needing to spend some money getting something small, but it not really hitting the mark. And this is Shannon helps us guide us through how do we identify what some of these little luxuries can be for us and how we can lean into and build upon the skill of contentment. And it's a beautiful conversation. We can't wait
to share it with you. Yes, but first this episode is brought to you by the best spending decision right up there with Max and out your retirement plans, paying off debt. Pre Ordering our book Buy What you Love without going broke is one of the best spending decisions you can make for yourself this month. This one purchase can set you on a trajectory of making insanely informed
and whise spending decisions for the rest of your life. Plus, when you pre order, you get extra freebies like monthly live virtual life skills classes with Jen and I. We will be there live talking about meal plans and.
Mending mendils and saving money on transportation on a whole all the things improvements.
Yeah, it helps us a ton if you buy the book before it publishes in January. If you order it now, you know you've already set yourself up for a great gift come the new year that's going to help you make better spending decisions. And you get all these freebies leading up to January. You get to hang out with us more So get yours at buy what you Love book dot com. Then submit the form indicating that you bought the book, you pre ordered the book, and then you'll get your invite to the webinars.
Yeah, and we got five. You'll get five free webinars at this point, the longer you wait, the fewer webinars you get because obviously you don't get access to the ones you missed, like the one in August. But we're saving the best ones for last. So if you're if you're listening to this not till like November or something, don't worry. The December January ones are the best, just like this episode. This is episode is probably one of
the best ones that we've done in a while. I and it's just because it felt when you can find a kindred soul to have a conversation about something that you are both really like jived on at the same time really passionate about it is it's just life giving.
And that is the conversation we had with Shannon. So if you are interested after hearing about this, to hear a little bit more about kind of what just Jill and I have to say on contentment as it relates to spending in finances q UP Episode three sixty nine,
How to be content without being complacent. We do talk a little we know, we don't go into it, but we do mention it in the episode, and then episode three forty two the importance of honoring your season, and episode two fifty six using gratitude journaling to help you spend less. We also mentioned that a little bit in this episode, So those three are super relevant, especially content without being complacent and gratitude journaling. So Shannon Abeles is
the founder of the Simply Luxurious Life. She hosts The Simple Sophisticate and she has been like talking about cultivating true contentment, the art of living a life of quality over quantity, and talking about all these things since two thousand and nine. She taught English and high school for twenty years, so she is a really great gifted teacher, and so now she does The Simple Sophisticate full time. And she loves France and England and those things inspire
how she talks about luxury. So we just loved how it just felt like such a pure conversation.
So I felt calmed after this conversation.
We do a week.
Because we're so much more calm because of Shannon. So let's get into it.
Shannon, Welcome to Frugal Friends podcast. We are delighted to have you.
Oh so tickle to be here. Thanks for having me, Jen and Jil that be fun.
It was. It was such an honor for me to be on your podcast, The Simple Sophistic Hit. It was such a fun conversation and I love your style your podcast. So I'm excited to introduce our listeners to you and to your podcast and just your perspective and your voice through this episode. So to kick us off and get us started, tell us a little bit about kind of the whole idea of what you're spreading here, this contentment, how it differs from happiness, Why it's such an important distinction.
Just what do you want to say? No, thanks for that and that opportunity. No, no, no, that's good. And for your listeners who may not know me, I actually was a teacher, an English teacher for twenty years. So I'm going to break down the language of contentment and versus happiness. So I think a lot of the times we oftim will use the same word, but we understand it differently, and so then the conversation never goes or are our understanding of how to achieve it never actually
materializes because we don' actually understand what it means. So I taught English for twenty years, retired in twenty twenty one, I taught upper division English and high school AP language, So we really broke down words. We broke down analysis of text and persuasion and all the different tools of rhetoric. But throughout my entire career I taught the Latin and Greek roots. And so if you look at contentment versus happiness,
they are similar. So people when they conflate the two, they're really not They're off base, but they're not entirely off Basi's completely understandable. So if you look at the word happiness, hap by the definition, if you look at hap, it comes from Old English meaning luck or chance, and so it's something beyond us that happens. We have to be present, we have to show up, we have to see it. We have to then dance with it and celebrate it. But it's not entirely in our control to
create it. Contentment is what I like to call the parent of happiness. The more Jen you and I were speaking a little bit before we started taping here, the more grounded and secure the parent is, the more happiness is going to occur in your life, the more fulfilled your child is going to be, if that makes sense. So when you have contentment, you break down the word contentment con is broken means with or together, and mint
means full of. So my definition based on all the different dictionaries out there, and I love going through dictionaries because some one dictionary out there calls contentment complacency, and you all know it's not, because that's part of what your argument is as well. And that's why I love beyond the shows. We have very similar ethos. Contentment is the farthest thing from complacency. It's an active engagement with life.
Contentment is you are satisfied and secure within yourself. Because if we look at ment, or excuse me, if you look at the word contentests, that's from the old French. And I'm going a little deep in the weeds here, but hanging there with me.
Nerd out, I'm here, I'm in it, I'm for it. Oh, I love it.
I love it. So contentest actually comes from Old French and it means to contain, to hold that which is contained. So when you are you have content mint the concept contentment you are satisfied, which I know that is also your definition of contentment and secure within yourself, within yourself. It's not based on anything outside of yourself. It's not based on the size of your house, your status in society as far as relationships, how outside of yourself, the
people in your life, what society says. It's how you feel about what you have done and are doing, and how you live your life. It's all within and so that is That is how I distinguish happiness and contentment. They're they're they're not completely separate, but one is the parent, one is the one is the child, and happiness will occur more frequently when you have contentment grounded and you know, consistently in your life.
Thank you for this lesson, and there you have it. Folks. Oh, it's so fun for us when we come across across such congruent messaging, and it's not as if it's entirely our messaging, right, we're talking about the roots of words here. But I think when we're able to grasp what these things mean and to recognize, as you're describing this is somewhat within our control, we there is a method by
which we can kind of practice contentment. And the importance of that distinction, I think is what you're describing here exactly.
Yeah, So, like, how has true content contentment like shown up in your life and specifically if you have any stories about like how it's changed your view on money, but like how has this true contempment kind of like changed your actions, like transformed.
You well, you know, and Jill alluded to it as well. It's a practice. It's these are a set of skills to learn, so you can't go buy it off the shelf. And it's not gonna Once you understand what those skills are and I can mention them, mention them here in a second, you have to start to It's like a muscle.
You have to start to train yourself to consciously put yourself in a situation to Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna practice this mindfulness practice of meditation so that I can I can step back from my mind and see my thoughts instead of being led by my thoughts.
That takes practice.
I mean, you might want to be able to do that in day one, but even the most advanced person is a novice every single day because it's every single day presents us with different, you know, circumstances we have no control over. So it's the learning the skills. And for me, I guess maybe it's being the teacher that I am, or maybe it's being someone who's constantly curious. I've always been a curious individual. But I'm like, Okay, how do I feel more content? And that? And content
is the feeling. Contentment is what involves all the skills. It's the concept. And so if i'm you know, early in my life, it's like, this is what This is really unsettling. Why everyone else seems to enjoy doing this or wants to live this way?
It doesn't work for me.
Why So it's a it's a choice to explore yourself. And and and when I started to sort of make decisions following my inner voice or what many people call intuition, I started to realize, oh wow, oh wow, I'm energized doing something that other people would be drained by.
That's okay.
If they're drained by it and don't want to do it, that's their choice. It's not a comparison. It's an acknowledgment of what brings you to life.
Life.
And when I started, you know, part of the reason I went to education is it's the only thing I saw my mom and dad. You know, my mom was a teacher as well, So it's the only thing I saw I wanted to be financially secure. To bring it back to our money conversation, I was like, Okay, I want to be financially scared.
I was secure.
I want to be you know, independent. I saw my mom was able to do that. I want to do that. It seems like a fairly not stress less st job. But my dad was a police officer, and I was like, nah, I don't want to do that. I appreciate what he's doing for our community, but I don't think my temperament would be suited for that. So I didn't have a lot of exposure to a lot of jobs at my young age. But when I got into college, I fell
in love with English. I love the written word, the analysis of it, and so I started to honor that just at a young age. And I think once you start really listening to yourself, you start to see glimmers of what contentment can be. Sometimes it's easy because you just happen to buy chance be with a family or a group of friends that applaud what you love to
do anyway. But what makes it difficult is when you're with a family or an institution or a culture or friends who belittle you or make you feel less than when you do something that brings you to life. And that's why these skills will teach you to find the strength to be courageous enough to make decisions that lead you into different directions that ultimately will help you find that community that supports you, but at the same time you connect with on an equal basis, If that makes sense.
It's sounding a little bit like we're describing contentment as this muscle we can almost grow these kind of exercises skill sets we can collect and lean into along the way in order to increase the degrees of satisfaction we experience internally with our stuff, our status or situation. And you've kind of described a little bit of your journey, but I'm curious at this stage, what does leaning into
contentment look like? What are some of the practices that you're finding are helpful for you to experience that satisfaction regularly.
Yeah.
Well, one thing and we talked about it in our conversation Jenna on my episode is gratitude. It's it's looking around you and being present so you can then see all that is going well around you. We have blue sky today, there's no smoke I'm going to celebrate that. I'm going to make sure I'm outside and I'm doing something outside that I wasn't able to do last week when it was smoky. I have running water, Electricity is on today, it was out yesterday. Little things I have,
My bills are paid. You know, the little thing the rose that is like one year old, bloomed for the first time, I'm going to sell. It may not be the grand garden in England, but it's it's celebrated so grade regularly. It doesn't have to be in your journal even but you can. You can absolutely have a gratitude genurnal. It may not even be something that you say out loud, but you see it, you notice it. The other and
really powerful practice is mindfulness. And we hear that word a lot lately in our culture, and it's not a bad thing that we're hearing. I think it's great. But meditation is a key thing that helps hold us in that moment. And meditation doesn't need to be a scary or contrive thing, and there are a lot of ways to meditate. That's something I do talk about in my course. I really break it down and actually have a guided practice of meditation with the students who enroll. You can
get meditate with me for three minutes. Start with one minute, three minutes, I'm at ten minutes. Now I'm I know for ten years and I didn't start noticing the benefits until just three or four years ago. It takes a while, and everyone's journey is different. So that's another key skill. Another one is emotional intelligence, and this is a chosen skill. We do not come out of the womb knowing how
to understand why we feel what we feel. We have to choose to understand ourselves and our emotions we're feeling because everyone's temperament is different. And I see a temperament versus personality, because temperament would be the introvert, the extrovert, the ambivert. What stimulates you energetically, and that's something that's
primarily nature. You're born with it and entirely there's some nurturing going on there too, But it's the self knowledge and the emotional intelligence has to do with you as well as observing it in others. And when you are aware of your surroundings, so self awareness and also awareness in your world, you start to engage more depending on the outcome you want. But I think most of us
want a positive outcome. You start to engage more lovingly, with more kindness, and that's the two steps I always we begin the course with this, and I carry this throughout the two modes of engagement with the world and yourself. Engage with loving kindness, Engage with integrity, and that's to yourself and to the world. What I mean by integrity is honoring your boundaries, honoring what you need, maybe not
what you want. Maybe you're gonna have to compromise, you know, with that with your partner, with your children, with your boss. But you're not gonna go too far to disrespect yourself. But at the same time, you want to make sure you honor your values, whatever those values may be. So those are a pretty good list of what we talk about and teach in the course. But that's a simple one. I think that was one of one of the things that I wanted to talk about. What's the simplest thing
you can do? Engage right now with loving kindness and integrity, And we talk, we talk.
So much about these are just like good ideas, good principles, right, but we so often don't practice them because we don't have a deeper value for them at face value. But if people knew how much being devoid of those practices actually impacts tangible things in our life, like our finances, like our mental health, all of these things. It is affecting tangible things, but we're just not taught to value them inherently, so we don't see the connection between those tangible things.
Good point. Yeah, you're exactly right, Jen. The the and it's the abstract versus the concrete right and the simplistic way of doing it is focusing on I can buy a house, I can get clothes, so that will make me happy. But wait a second, why are you?
Why?
Why I go deeper? And that's the complex part that it takes time. But once you do it, those decisions of what you purchase, of what you spend your money on, it's so much simpler, so much simpler.
Shannon, you said something earlier about choosing to understand yourself, and I wrote it down because I feel like just that phrase is a guide post in all of this, and a lot of what we talk about with values based spending is it needs to begin with who am I? What is life giving to me? What brings me joy? What are my goals and these other pieces that you're describing.
It can take work, but choosing to understand ourselves, our emotions, what we're experiencing, and putting in these practices and skill sets to aim at contentment, it's all so beautiful. I
just wanted to underscore it. But I also want to hear your perspective because one of the things that drew me to your podcast initially is you even use the phrase quality to buy quality over quantity, which is one of our kind of new phrases that we've been using over the past year, so our our audience is familiar with that, but you also talk about like simple pleasures and luxuries, but yet in this very kind of holistic approach.
So I want to hear what you have to say about this, how you define true luxuries, how this has impacted your level of contentment, how you kind of pair your enjoyment of just really lovely things with contentment and you know, not desiring or more than we need or this over consumption.
Right right, and then it exhausts us and then our bank accounts low and then we're stressed. And yeah, it leads into everything you know, And I have to start with where a lot of this inspiration came from a lot of inspiration. Quality of our quantity came from when I studied in France, and I studied out in an age in the Loire Valley, and I was twenty. I
had never no one in my world spoke French. Went to Europe for goingness sake, But I fell in love with the quality of not just things, but the quality of time given. And I saw that really increase the enjoyment and the pleasure of everyday life. Our meals would last for literally three hours and you don't even look at the clock. The food was simple, it was seasonable, but because it was seasonabally, it was delicious. So that's honestly what began the simple luxurious life. The simple luxury
aspect of it was the French culture. And I know there are other cultures who likely do this, but I think the French do.
It pretty well.
They've been great teachers. And so what for me simple luxury is it involves intention and it involves intention. What I mean by intention is, you know, it may not be it may take time for me to acquire this thing, or it may take time for me to understand what my tastes are for that particular, for a particular tea. But when I find it, I'm gonna I'm gonna deeply
appreciate it. It may be inexpensive. It may be a Twining's tea, which is not that expensive, but it might be it might be a Platitae, which is not terribly expensive, but it maybe twice as much. But I know, because I know what's gonna calm me down in the afternoon. When I pour a cup of it, I've had not so great tea, so I know there's a difference, and so it brings me great comfort. And so simple luxury is about comfort, but comfort achieved with intentions. So when
you achieve it or acquire it, you appreciate it. So it marries that idea of appreciation with intention, and then they're not asking for more constantly. That's why we get away from the quantity. I don't need more tea. I need good tea because of how I'm going to how it's going to elevate my day.
There's so much I would just want to put on stickers. I'm not even a sticker person. I just want to like hold these statements as truth before being constantly. Comfort achieved with intention.
Yeah, love that, yes, well, And I think sometimes the luxury component. A lot of people will find the blog the podcast and they think that this is a luxury like we're gonna be on yacht, so we're gonna travel around the world and five star restaurants. You know, I would love to go to a great five star restaurant if it's worthy of that, and I've saved up for it, and I know a little bit about the background, but I am not going to be doing it for status
as far as to get approval from outside world. And I definitely am going to watch my money to make sure I'm investing in something I really really love. So it's not luxury in the sense of dollar amount. It's luxury and the sense of what we just talked about and what brings you comfort. And that's back to the knowing yourself. What's going to bring you comfort. What what brings other people comfort is their choice. It's not We're not judging. I think that's the other part of it.
We're not comparing, We're not judging. We are engaging our own journey and being inspired by other's. Sure, that's that's great.
Mm hmm. Yeah, you are speaking the language of our listeners. I think I can just see like behind the speakers of cars, like heads nodding. And we talk so much about like values based spending in honoring these higher values like family, friends, fulfilling with big But it's harder, I think, maybe to look at the tangible things. Almost you'd think it'd be easier. It's the first place our head goes
onto what we value. But it's almost harder to look at these tangible things and be like, Okay, now that I know where my higher values are, my higher needs are, how do I decide what's going to what to buy? Because when it may not fall automatically in it. And that's you've just given a framework on how to decide whether something is in line with your values or not.
It's it comes from knowing within, it comes with testing, hy testing and like choosing that intentional comfort, and you can you can also choose intentional discomfort, which is in the testing phase, but really being intentional with it.
Paying attention to what you learn. I mean, there's always a lesson to learn of something doesn't work out. I mean it's you can't hit the gold mine on your first shot. It might happen sometimes and that's when you really celebrate it. Oh my gosh, that's love. But how are you going to know you hit the gold mine if you haven't tried other things to know that it is? I don't know. It depends on the journey, It depends on how many other experiences you've had. Maybe there's some
that are similar, you know. That's but yeah, that's part of the fun too. It's when you you know, you grow as an individual of how you handle unlunched moments.
Yes, so we we've definitely. I love this phrase you use, like enjoy everyday luxuries on in every day income and so you kind of touched on it with you know, talking about a nice cup of tea? Are there other ways like that our listeners can be kind of attuned to or or other skills for finding what their everyday luxuries can be they're simply luxurious.
Well, I'm gonna start a little bit maybe a little broader on this, but I think if it does start with enjoying your own company, or at least starting to learn how to enjoy your own company. So even if you're an extrovert, regularly finding time in solitude, and this may just be as few as fifteen minutes, that is fine. But once you start spending time in your own company, and I do mean on your own company, I mean you can have your dogs, your cat, your pets with
you because they're not going to influence you. You know, they're not going to.
Judge or laugh or whatever or a plod.
That's the thing. You really want to be away from anything that will influence you to do or not do something. Or do you like this or not like this? Go to a restaurant, you know, for lunch on your own, what do you like? Go on a walk and see what or you know, maybe you're traveling and meet your partner, your family. Say you know, I'm gonna take the first half the day on my own. I just want to explore and see where your feet lead you and pay
attention to what catches your eye. I think so often we become unconsciously, it's unconsciously normalized into our behavior to do whatever people are going to applaut or accept, and so we don't really realize we're going off track of ourselves. And if I could, there's a quote actually that kind of ties to this with regards to knowing yourself, and I think this is kind of it's a warning, but it's also helpful. This is from a psychologist I Link
Strauss Cohen. She writes, quote, without realizing it, you may be negatively impacting your effectiveness by seeking others approval. This is because you probably avoid doing things that are important to you, feel anxious about trying new things outside your comfort zone, and get stuck worrying about what others might expect from you. Needing approval may you to reject potential opportunities because you're too anxious and believe your performance has
to be perfect. It may cause you to fear failing so much that you give up before you start. And the give up meaning to know what speaks to you so that you can build a day, your every day that infuses you with energy, not drains or energy. I don't know that I didn't go directly into the answer, did I.
But that's but you gave over. You gave us what we needed.
Okay, Okay, yeah, we need mindset. I think we love the tangible tips and those are helpful as well, but when our actions originate with our thoughts, it's a very important place to begin and to continue cultivating regularly because it's going to influence. But I love that even the examples that you are giving here is helping us to think creatively and how can I enjoy my daily life
in a simple way that is really invigorating. It helps to lead to contentment that again, most of it is going to not cost money or cost very minimal amounts of money, and yet be able to realize, oh, I'm enjoying luxuries here, and what that just does to our mindset then around spending, Well, then do I really feel the need to hop online and purchase some twenty dollars skirt that's going to break down in a couple of months because it's not well made and I've taken you know,
these companies are taking advantage of labor. So, yeah, when we're able to really lean into what are the current benefits received in my life right now? And what are the things that I particularly enjoy and where can I be with loving kindness letting myself engage in those simple pleasures. Yeah, these are the things that we can be looking at.
You all said this in your book, and we talked about this with marketing to speak to the skirt and you know, trying to not pray, but to to to try to tempt you to buy something at a really cheap price when you're at the end of the day really exhausted, maybe, or an impulse, impulse purchase. But it's we're taught, or we're conditioned often in our culture to want to constantly want, which takes us out of the
present moment. If we can create an every day that we love and that and what we do talk about a lot is rituals. Rituals that it's not a routine, so they're similar. But routine is something you do that simplifies your day, that works and amplifies your day. But rituals, when you deeply savor it and you are in the moment fully appreciating it, Routines are not mindless necessarily, but
they actually allow your mind to be free. And so rituals, like, for example, my morning ritual, I wake up on Monday morning. I genuinely love my Monday mornings, and it's the same as a Tuesday, so don't it's not different, but it's Monday because I excited about what I get to do, but I'm not rushing. So we get up, the dogs get fed. My older pup sleeps still, and I'm like, you just keep sleeping, and I get my hot water
going for my tea, actually lemon water. I did my tea after that, and then Nell and I sit out in the porch in the summertime and I meditate, I listen to the birds. I'm not rushing because it's about six o'clock, six thirty. And then I wake up Norman, and then I feed Norman, and then we go for our walk usually, and then we come home. We have breakfast outside and then the day starts around nine o'clock.
But it's not rushed. I mean, I am I know that as a teacher, I know that sometimes you have a job that you have to get up way way too early and get to work at seven, six thirty in the morning. But even then, okay, at the end of the day, what's a ritual that would really really energize you or conclude the day well, And it doesn't have to cost anything. I mean that was water and lemon and my dogs, you know, And for me, my dogs are my big companions. They bring a lot of
joy to my life. But it doesn't have to be with anybody, or can be with your partner, children or yeah, so it takes you away from wanting, and so you have that space that we've talked about. You have that pause. So whenever you are going to maybe buy something, you're not doing it to to feel better in that moment.
Prompt for us. Thanks for all those examples, speaking of a ritual that we love to engage in an every episode. Yes, the bill.
Of the week.
That's right, it's time for the best minute of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name is William. Maybe you paid off your mortgage, maybe your car died and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore. Duck bills, Buffalo bills, Bill clon this, it's the bill of the week.
I love it. I kind of wanted to say that more quietly because of the space that we're in Normally, Shannon, yell it more. So far you can do it. Don't take too it's early.
We can all get woken up a little bit more.
I mean, I feel good about I feel good. It feels appropriate for the space that we've created. But so every week we invite our listeners and our guests to give us their bill for the week, and Shannon, we are excited to hear yours well.
I hope I don't know how many gardeners you have out there, but I think just gonna apply to anything and all sincerity. So I have a garden and I have one solo tall pine tree. So I live in Bend, Oregon, so there's pine trees everywhere and you need to take care of them. And I've never ever had to take care of this one yet, but it was time. My neighbor was saying, it's hitting my house, Shannon, you need to take care of it. But actually she was willing to pay for it, like no, I mean, are split
it with me. I was like, no, no, it's my property. I'll take care but anyway, so she got an estimate and I was like, okay, I'll call that guy and i'll see. I'll ask some questions and I got his price and then I kept shopping around to get other prices. I saved three hundred dollars by shopping around getting the exact same service. And when the guys were done, and it was fun to watch them, they're like acrobats in
the tree. It wasn't a fun bill to pay, but it's a bill I would only have to pay every five to ten years. And they also and this is the other thing. Before I got the estimate, I said, am I going to have you know, final?
Okay?
Like this is how I want it?
Oh?
Yeah, you can have that. So as soon as I knew I was going to have it trimmed the way I felt I needed to be trimmed and I could have an okay with it, he did have to come back a second time and fix it. I'm looking at because it was out this window, but it's healthy now. So it's protecting my house, protecting her house and as much fun as it wasn't to pay that bill in the winter, I established a stronger relationship with my neighbor and I saved three hundred dollars. I was like, I
do you want for sise numbers? I didn't know if you want precise numbers or not.
Yes, I we love savings, we love community the main thing, all of these things.
It's important for for I mean people probably already know this, but just to reiterate, get get multiple estimates. I know we want things to be fixed, especially if they're things that are broken in our house or broken wherever our car. We want it done and fix them back to life. But get estimates, because you just you don't know how much money might be thrown away by and not to always get the cheapest because sometimes you want like quality, quantity,
quality work. But yep, yeah, it's like it's worth it. I've saved more money by getting estimates and sometimes I go to the first person, but that one I was like, oh, I'm going to save three hundred dollars, I'm going that route.
Amen. Yes, we love, we love a mid tier figure. Like you know, we're we're not trying to get the best, the most expensive. We're not trying to get the lowest. We're trying to get a deal with quality.
There you go.
Exactly, exactly, Yes, I mean I get it. If you get away with the price, do it. But I'm gonna keep shopping. Competition pays off in in markets. That's yeah, competition is okay, right, Yes.
It's such a great example. I think between negotiation and shopping around, I think anytime we're able to push back against the sense of urgency and take our time and make the best decision for us for whatever the thing is that we're trying to achieve. It's awesome if you all listening have a bill that you want to submit, if it's about saving money because you negotiated and shopped around.
If it's about not minding to spend the money, you just went with the first quote you've got and you're good to pay it because you have an emergency fund or just your name is Bill and you don't even have trees. But you want to tell us what it's like to be a person named Bill. Rugal friendspodcast dot com slash Bill. Leave us your bill, and now it's time for.
That one is less abrasive that one. We went full in on.
Good sound effects.
I love it.
Thank you.
We do all our own sound effects, you know Seinfelds right, yeah, we yeah, we we don't hire this out. You know, we get better with age, all right, So this is our vulnerability round. We will all answer this question, and it is what is a simple luxury that you are going to enjoy today?
It's Wednesdays, it's market in real time, it's market day. I'm going to the market, going to the farmers market.
That's a good one.
Probably not going to get much, but I love just being in that environment. It's just a joy.
So yeah, yeah, you have farmers markets on Wednesdays.
Two once on Saturday for the tourists primarily. And then this one is just food. It's just it's what we call the grocery market. But it's it's amazing.
What what are some of your favorite to get at the market.
And I'm getting the everyday foods, I'm getting eggs, I'm getting my berries. Berries are big. I get lots of berries. Marionberries are big here in Oregon. Do you have marion berries? You probably do you marry No, marion berries were a hybrid and os you made them organs between blackberries and raspberries. Oh, if you ever get a chance to have a marion berry, Wow, they're out of season now, they're just finished. So I always go and get whatever the berry is in season at the berry guy's place.
And that's interesting. I would describe a mulberry as a cross between a BlackBerry and a raspberry.
We have those here, mulberry we don't have them here? Okay, interesting, you have to look that up because I'm pretty sure that that was the Yeah, But no, they're they're a little milder than like, they're not as tart as a BlackBerry, but they're deeper purple than a raspberry in there kind of the middle middle size very good.
Yeah, that's exactly how I would describe a mulberry. Berry.
That's interesting, but I haven't never Yeah, oh no, I'm really curing. I'm writing that down. I'm gonna go find a mulberry.
I love. I love a farmer's market. Our farmer's market is in season right now. It doesn't come back till October. Oh Florida, right, yeah, yeah, it's just too hot to do anything here right now.
It is like our winter that makes sense, only we still get the long days the daily which is nice.
But we have we actually have a Tuesday farmers market Jill and Gulfport.
Oh perfect.
Yeah.
We did have a load on farmers markets and kind of comparing it to grocery store prices and did find that for most things, the farmers market is going to be a better option, especially if you're looking to support local and get you know, more organic items.
Yeah, that's huge knowing you're eating.
Yeah, you have you have to be like if you're shopping with like the intention of not buying the cheapest thing, like quality, then you are better off at a farmer's market.
It's good to know. All right, Well, I'm good, I'm doing the right I'm doing good.
Yeah you already knew that, but well we're just you're to a fermit, Jen, what's your answer?
Okay? So mine and this is truly my morning ritual that I love is my morning cup of coffee. I wake up when my five year old wakes me up at seven am, and we'll make the cup of coffee and sit down until the baby wakes up. And it's just like coffee with a splash of whole milk in my pajamas on my couch, watching my five year old play or color or do whatever he's going to do in the morning, or wine because he wants to be playing the switch and it's not time yet.
You know.
So fun.
That is my morning ritual right now, and it is my simple luxury. And then sometimes in the evening I will enjoy a cocktail of of whatever feels right right now. It's gin and tonics that feels right. Yeah, so if sometimes like maybe I'll need it before my kids go to sleep, but usually it's like after they go to bed and the house is quiet, or maybe sometimes before the baby gets home, and it's in between that like I'm done working, I haven't picked up the baby yet,
and I'm just like at peace, lovely. I love beverages, and there's a thing I love all beverages.
Or just beverages to start with a cea coffee cocktail.
Yeah, it's not true. I don't actually love all beverages. I don't do beer or wine, but or juice. Okay, I don't do all beverages. But I do value beverages more highly than food.
That's good.
That sounds love love.
A simple luxury I'm going to enjoy today is reading a couple chapters of the book I'm currently working through. I have so many simple luxuries. Honestly, which again is another reason I really connected with your show, Shannon and you as a person, is this just speaks to me. I really do try and fill my life with things that just bring me joy. Yeah. One of those things will be reading a book later today.
I love escaping into a book.
It's just yeah, I have I've rediscovered it recently. I didn't. I didn't totally have the space or the life season to kind of make the space for years now, But within this past year, I've I've found we were renovating and all sorts of things, but lately it's like I could actually read it. Just a good book and I've been devouring Yeah.
She has been going through them at least make it joke. We did our book club episodes about how like I was going through all these books and Jill just like children's books and she's beating me.
Now, I do love children's books. That's a simple luxury for me too. I don't have kids, but I still just think that the way that they are able to simply portray sometimes really complex Yeah, themes and topics is so beautiful. Yeah, it's very true.
It's hard to be simple and those of to get across those points. Yeah, yeah, good point.
Yeah. Okay, speaking of my adoration of you, Shannon, can you tell our audience where they can get more of you?
Oh gosh. Yeah. So you can visit my blog the Simply Luxurious Life dot com or a very simple U R L S T s l L dot co and you'll see the blog which I post three to four times every single week. You can also find the podcast there, but you can also find the Simple Sophisicate podcast wherever
you listen to your podcasts. And then the course that I was talking about, the Contentment Masterclass, is also on that website and you'll see it there on the main menu titled classes, and it'll have a frequently asked question page. You can watch a trailer about the course and all that stuff, as well as my books. My three books are there as well for you to look up if you're curious.
Oh yeah, lovely, thank you for your inspiration today, Shannon.
Thank you very much for having me. I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation. That was a lot of fun.
Yeah, that was a That was a framework. I think Shannon gave a really great explainer on how she very much expanded, like what we have in our book by What you Love Without Going Broke, available for pre order now. She gave an expanded framework for diving into being comfortable with who you are. Like we talk about how to ask yourself questions to discover who you are, and she has given a framework to be comfortable with who you are.
And a lot of it marries the you know, we talk about this in the second chapter and we talk about contentment in the ninth chapter, and she really married those two chapters. They live far away in our book, and she really did a great job of marrying them and bringing them together in reality.
It's so cool to hear these concepts from someone outside of the personal finance space and help you to really realize, Yes, this is not just for personal finance, this is for our whole lives and how much it can touch every aspect of our life. And again, why we so emphasize beginning with mindset. So oh, I'm so glad we had her on and yeah again, I would absolutely recommend her podcast as well. If this one resonated with you, She's a good one.
Yes, and thank you so much for leaving us your kind reviews. We love, love love reading them, especially this one from set Talbot. It says, my favorite podcast happens to be five stars they go. I love Jen and Jill's podcast, especially the humor. I find them very motivating and encouraging, and it actually has helped me start new habits and save some of my pay each week. I'm in Australia, but most of what they talk about is relevant for where I live. Also, thanks amazing.
We have a small but mighty following in Australia and I'm so glad to know that our content is relevant to some of these different nations. We've got a following in Canada, as well, So I'm just thinking world tour, Jen UK. We've got book tour.
We've definitely had some people, several people email about wanting to preorder the book in the UK and it's not available internationally yet, but we will keep you updated. It always for these things with American publishers, they publish in America first and then if the book does well, then
they will do a run internationally. So if you want to help our frugal friends that live in Australia UK, please preorder the book buy what you loovebook dot com because your pre order will help it help them be able to order.
Yeah, whatever you want your next action step to be, I mean certainly it can be meditation. And then once you're done with that, pre order the book, leave us a review and reading, listen to our next podcast episode and we'll see you next time.
We'll see you next time. Frugal Friends is produced by Eric sirianni.
Okay, Jen Okay, I have something very funny to share with you, and I can't believe I forgot about it until just now. Yes, speaking of our book, so recently, I was having a conversation with my dad and every time I'm with him. He he's so excited about the book and where are we at in the process and blah blah blah. And the other day he was like, okay, so now remind remind me, Oh, I'm so sorry, remind me what it's called. Is it how to Buy Things
you can't afford? I lost it, Jen, just absolute like, couldn't.
Be bled, your dad would be proud of, could not breathe.
With how hard I was laughing at this how to buy things you can't afford? And I don't think I corrected him. I'm just like, we're gonna go with that one. Absolutely. Yes. Also, it reminded me of that SNL s get with Amy Poehler and Steve Martin. Any of our SNL fans will know where it's basically like they're a married couple. I forget the comedian who's like the financial instructor, but.
Yeah, he's the one that doesn't have a name. He's just a face.
Basically a one page financial course where it's like, don't buy things if you don't have the money for it. But what if I really want it? Okay, Okay, I think I see what you're saying. But what about if I want to buy it now, but I don't have the money for it, Then none, it goes. It felt like that, like the title how to Buy Award, So if you also want to learn how to buy what you can't afford buy what you Love book dot com.
Tell them what they want, give them what they need. Buy what you loovebook dot com