Morgan Housel

Let's go back to when I was 19.

And I think we were all, you know, I had that age.

I was a saver, but at 19, it meant like saving a hundred bucks was like a feat.

That was a hurrah, like a hundred bucks.

Or if I saved a thousand bucks, like, wow, that's crazy.

And let's say, I don't know what the numbers are, but let's say because I invested that, that a hundred dollars is now worth 500.

It's probably something like that with what the market's done.

$500 today does not mean that much to me.

It's not that big a deal.

So was it worth it?

Or if I had a time machine, should 19-year-old Morgan have taken his friends out to dinner with that $100 versus invested it into amount of money that means nothing to me today?

And my response was, I don't think that's the right way to think about it because I think it's impossible to have a YOLO paycheck to paycheck mentality in your young years and then assume that you're going to flip a switch when you're 35 and become a saver.

And so I think the reason that I've had good financial habits, in my mind at least, through today is because I started them at 19.

It's not that the $100 turned into $500.

It's that the habits I formed in that era brought me through today and I could not have changed the habits when I turned 35.

It just doesn't work like that.

And so that's part of why I don't have a lot of regret for saving money that was –

a huge amount to me back then that has grown to a completely insignificant amount to me today.

It was the habits that I formed back then that, that made all the difference.

I'll do it.