When 'Feelings Are Data' To Navigate Clients' Financial Planning Trade-Offs: Kitces & Carl Ep 196

Speaker A: Feelings are a legitimate form of data in human decision making. Because financial planning is almost always decision making. Under uncertainty, feelings are not peripheral to the work. They are central.

Speaker B: One draws with a sharpie, the other nerds out with spreadsheets. But both share a passion for helping real financial advisors get better. Join the industry's preeminent blogger, Michael Kitces, and client communication expert, Carl Richards. And as they share their unique perspectives and advice on, um, how to more effectively serve your clients, Be more intentional when building your own business and make sure you actually have a life in the process. Without further ado, here are your hosts, Kitces and Karl.

Speaker A: Well, greetings, Carl, Michael Kitces, so fun to talk to you today.

Speaker C: I am, I am excited to talk to you today.

Speaker A: Let me ask you something. How are you feeling?

Speaker C: How am I feeling?

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: Um, honestly, like, I'm feeling a little bit tired. Uh, this is, as of our recording, we're still end of spring, beginning of summer, which for me is like the tail end of spring conference season when we have like a whole slew of industry events, one week after another after another. And so, uh, I've been road warring for the past five weeks or so and still have two left before I finally get to hang out at home and not, not go to an airport for a month, which I'm really excited about. So nice feeling a little bit drained right now with all the stuff going on.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: Overall work, life balance is actually pretty good on the whole, but busy season is still busy. It makes the light season more appreciated. Busy season still busy. It's a little tiring.

Speaker A: Yeah. How does that. I mean, I'm actually quite curious now. Um, when you feel tired, what does that actually feel like? Does it feel like we're in your body? Like, what, what happens? Describe feeling tired.

Speaker C: Uh, feeling tired. I think it's. For me, it starts with like, my brain just doesn't want to think anymore. Like, I would like to sit down and be able to do something very mindless that I do not need to exert any, like, particular brain energy towards. Maybe it's playing a light video game, it's watching a show with the kids that does not require me to think terribly much. Like, I just need to do something where I can mostly, uh, turn the brain off because the brain's just tired.

Speaker A: Yeah. Well, it's fun. Thanks for allowing me to ask because what I want to talk about, I think.

Speaker C: Where are we going with this, Carl?

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just had this really interesting experience and it goes along with your dollar symbol up There that you can just see the bottom of. Um, I've been as part of the book tour, traveling around asking people about the first feeling that comes up when they see a dollar sign. And it's, it's led to all these discussions and in FPA events particularly, it's always fun. And by the way, financial planners are not any better or worse than this. It's, it's actually all of us humans, it's just a very concentrated sample size of. Sometimes it's really hard for us to figure out what it means to feel something. Right. And I, that's led me on this, down this rabbit hole around like. But I, you know, I've noticed I've got other people in my life that I'll say, like, how did you make that really big important decision? Like, how did you decide between that and that? And it was like big, like, should I take that job? Should I marry that person? Should I move to the city? Like, big decisions. And uh, I keep uh, hearing this thing of like, God, just felt my way through it or it felt right or now and then I would dig a little bit more and realize there was a bunch of analysis that went on first. A whole bunch. Like in, uh, my presentations now, we sort of make fun of you a little bit by, by turning you into a verb. So we like there's. People have kitsis it to death.

Speaker C: Okay. Oh, that's the verb. You kitsis something to death with clearly deep, high quality analysis.

Speaker A: That's exactly right. Deep, high quality analysis. That's, that's what kitsis means. So you, uh, kitsis it. At the end of that, you're still sort of left with a little pile of like, uh, maybe you've narrowed it down to two, but the two are very like, take the job or don't.

Speaker C: Yep, yep.

Speaker A: Like marry the person or don't you move to a city or don't. Like, those are big decisions. And you're still not sure.

Speaker C: Mhm.

Speaker A: Because there's this weird thing in life called uncertainty. Right. Like there's no way to know. And when we get to that spot, in that little moment after all the analysis is done, we often. And we don't know that we're doing this and we don't acknowledge it and we give it short shrift. Like we just like, we downplay it, but we often feel our way into it. So I've been thinking about this. Like it are. Is there a world in which feelings are data? And I got a bunch of.

Speaker C: You're bigging up to you're trying to make feelings in the data for me.

Speaker A: I'm trying, I've got a bunch of claims to try and convince you and I'm m not, I'm not sure I'm right. But I want to have the argument because it's so fun. An argument meaning like yeah, yeah. So what, what comes up as soon as I like that whole thing of I've hits a stitch death, I got this last thing and then you say like oh, gut feel or it felt right or I felt my way through it or I just knew. How about that? I just knew. Yeah.

Speaker C: So this is actually stirring up some I guess resonance to me almost very literally on the feelings are data part. But I, I come to it from I guess the uh, the opposite end of the gut feeling my way to the conclusion. So when I reflect back on I think like a number of big probably for me like business and career decisions just I've, I've done a bunch of things and I have to reinvent myself every three years out of sheer compulsion. So I've had like a number of different business crossroads over the, over the years of you know, do this or pursue that or merge here or, or exit there are all the different things that crop up and uh, often when I'm going through one of those, you know, all kits it because you know, that's clearly what I do.

Speaker A: If you don't, who would.

Speaker C: Yeah. Um, but here's what I'll say. I'll, I'll get to, I'll call it like I'll get to a preliminary decision and say okay now let me, let me sit with this for usually like a day sit with it. It's, it's some, it's some version of I'm trying to give myself space to, to sleep on it because what I found and like I, I wish I could get back to whenever this happened the first time. And I, I don't know where it originated. It's like I'd love to have the great story and I, and I can't summoned it on the spot but here, here's what I found. I, I, I do my first round of evaluating the decision, right. You analyze it, you make your pros and cons columns, whatever your thing is.

Speaker A: Mhm.

Speaker C: And then I take it and I'll sit on it for, you know, sleep on it for a night. And when I wake up in the morning and I reflect on it, you know, one of two things happens. I wake up in the morning, reflect on and I'm like, I am Feeling really good about this, like it's a go. Or I wake up and there's some, you know, proverbial or actual, like, not in my stomach, something feels wrong. And so what's evolved for me over the years, it used to just be some version of, all right, well, it feels wrong. Maybe that means it's, it's not right. And I'm supposed to trust my gut and so I'm gonna, you know, change my mind or whatever the thing is. But now, I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm trying to, like, articulate my actual big decision, uh, process for making big decisions. If I wake up the next morning and I've got some version of that negative feeling, I literally go hunt at it. Like a data point. I think this is where I liked your feelings or data. I, um, start hunting for it. Like a data point. What's bothering me or holding me back, that this isn't actually feeling good. Like my right, my body, my gut is surfacing some additional knowledge or intuition or data point that I didn't realize I needed to be factoring in the way that I have. And I'm trying to think over the years like there was, uh, there was an opportunity that would have required me to do massive amounts of travel, even more than I've done historically. And it was a really cool offer and opportunity. And I woke up the next morning and it felt really bad in the pit of my stomach. And in trying to get to what it was, what I realized was, oh, I'm already starting to grieve how much I'm going to be away from the kids and not get to do some of the things I like doing from the kids. I guess I actually needed to wait that much more than I did. I mean, I was trying to give a thought, uh, to work life balance and family versus opportunity. But waking up and feeling so bad was like, okay. Apparently I did not give enough consideration to how much this was going to bother me on the family side. Now I need to reassess the decision and I'm realizing it's not, it's not a fit. Um, I had another one at one point of an M and A opportunity and things felt really good. It seemed really good on paper. And I woke up the next morning and it's not feeling good. And eventually trying to figure out why it didn't feel good. It came down to there's actually some culture, ish culture fit issues that just. I don't think I'm really going to fit into their culture. And the opportunity seems so cool and great that I was trying to push that down, because cool opportunity and numbers and opportunity and all the great stuff and feeling the feels as data, kind of literally for me was a reflection of. Okay, but I think there's some important parts of this that I've been. That my brain has been ignoring and my gut won't allow me to ignore. I think I need to sum of this back up.

Speaker A: Uh, all I really need to say at this point is Amen. Like, it's so good. That's so good.

Speaker C: I.

Speaker A: Can we. I just want to do one thing. Like, I want to maybe have you unpack one thing, and then I'll give you a couple of just like claims. I've got 12 of them. I'll just grab two or three and we'll just talk about them because, um, but before I do, will you describe for us? And I'm going to push you a little bit on it. Like, describe for us. You use the words feels wrong.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: Or felt wrong. I. Yeah, I made a decision. I woke up in the morning, and it feels wrong. What is. Describe that.

Speaker C: I mean, very literally in the. I mean, the proverbial gut feeling. Like, very literally.

Speaker A: If you were to point to it. It is actually in the gut.

Speaker C: Yes, yes. If I were to point. It is. It is absolutely, like, literally, physiologically in the gut. Like.

Speaker A: And how would you describe that to somebody who's never felt it?

Speaker C: Um, stomach. Like, stomach felt churning or cramped, or.

Speaker A: Would you go as far as butterflies?

Speaker B: Um,

Speaker A: like, unsettled.

Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, unsettled. I. I know. I. My brain at least associates butterflies in the stomach with, like, the positive. Like a positive. Like, you know, the. The butterflies flutter to my stomach because I just saw the love of my life kind of version. And like, this. This is like the bad version of butterflies. Like angry gnomes. So stomping. Not butterflies flapping. Uh, there we go.

Speaker A: Angry. That's really good. Angry gnomes.

Speaker C: Like some. Some like angry gnomes pounding from the inside, saying, like, you're.

Speaker A: But subtle.

Speaker C: You're forgetting something. You're missing something.

Speaker A: Um, or not subtle.

Speaker C: Usually not. So I thought, um, its presence was not subtle. Figuring out what to do with it was more subtle, which is when you

Speaker A: go on the hunt for the data like that.

Speaker C: Right. Like, what I. What I realized over the years of a. Various shares of good and bad decisions in and in retrospect. And I mean, I've. For anyone who listens to our Financial Advisor Success podcast, you know, we have our fair share of people who had some major decision they made that didn't work out in the advisor context, it's often like it's, you know, uh, it's a disastrous hire or it's a disastrous partnership or merger is like the most too common that I hear. And one of the questions I love to ask in those instances is in retrospect, could you have seen it coming? And everyone, everyone except like the one time it was just completely legit, like con man, fraud, uh, everyone says, oh,

Speaker A: yeah, I just knew it. I knew. I wish I had trusted myself.

Speaker C: I, I, what I hear is, uh, some version of there were signs, but I, I didn't ignore. I ignored them or there were signs want to see them, but I didn't go deep enough. Yeah, I mean, I think it's that. I think it's. There were signs, but I didn't want to see them because, you know, reasons growth, opportunity, money, things that tend to come particularly in those types of like partnership, merger or acquisition situations where, where I, I hear a lot of God south after the fact stories. Right. Uh, many motivated reasons to ignore that feeling. That feeling.

Speaker A: That's right.

Speaker C: And I found as I went through my share of them to like first I went through my share of them to get to. I should not have ignored that feeling.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: But then there was a second round for me of um, but what the heck was the feeling? Because the feeling, the feeling doesn't bring words. It just literally makes my stomach hurt and feel all knotted up because, you know, the angry gnomes are pounding, uh, trying to figure out what the thing is that's making it not feel good and surfacing. That I found is actually was a difficult skill set to develop and one that has become extremely helpful now.

Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker C: Well, because now I'll push it to try to get to a decision and then say, now I'm going to sleep on it. If I wake up and the gnomes are pounding, then I, I can go, I can go hunt for what my body realized I missed.

Speaker A: If, if we, that it would be, uh, incredibly valuable to talk about how you trained and practiced that. And maybe we can do that in a. Let's just see if we have time. If not, we'll do it in another episode Because I think, I think because here's the. I want to make a few claims because here's why this matters. I would just submit to you that the most important decisions you make personally, but also the most important thing you could do for clients is to help them get clear about this. Because it turns out uh, almost all your important decisions at the end are made. So here's one of the claims. Um, feelings are a legitimate form of data in human decision making, especially under uncertainty. And because financial planning is almost always decision making under uncertainty, feelings are not peripheral to the work. They are central. And I'm actually trying to make the claim that for me the claim goes really far which is feelings are more important. But let's just stick because I know that might cause too many problems. Let's just stick with it.

Speaker C: Don't push your case here.

Speaker A: At least they should be given equal weight. And right now they're giving, they're given zero weight by most of us in like the planning process.

Speaker C: So, so look from, from my end. So I guess it's interesting, you know I still even a feelings discussion I have to come to it from logical brain. Like logical brain. Like you uh, know me who likes to read a lot of stuff about neuroscience and brain science is look there's a lot of really interesting research out there that you know uh, intuition, gut feelings, our brain's ability to like make remarkable fast slice evaluations that turn out to be disturbingly accurate. Uh just like is is a thing for reasons that we still don't fully understand from, from the perspective of brain science but that like intuition evaluations are remarkably strong and good. And because they have curse of occur uh subconsciously they're not usually expressed verbally through logic brain. They're expressed through feelings and body expression which is where like gut, gut feelings come from. Uh, and, and so in like in a very literal feelings are data. I've gotten intrigued by this because I literally now if I have a decision to make, I'm trying to set up a situation where gut feeling will weigh in on this decision and either give it a thumbs up or give me an indicator that there's data I missed.

Speaker A: So good. Yeah. Like just even learning what does a yes feel like and what does a no feel like. And I would like angry gnomes is going to be great. We're going to have kits's T shirts that have angry gnomes on them.

Speaker C: But as long as the

Speaker A: they'll be blue Smurfs. They'll be Smurfs. It's fine. Angry blue Smurf.

Speaker C: Thank you.

Speaker A: But the, the for me it often feels like just a puzzle piece that won't fit.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker A: Like the last piece. Like it won't fit or snap. You know, like it fit right. Like it's a very, it's much, it's much more subtle for me. It's almost, I mean sometimes it's blinking red lights, but most of the time it's just the same feeling I would have of like, ah, uh, like it feels forced. The puzzle piece isn't. And if I look back I'm like, oh man, I've been feeling that since the very first time this idea even surfaced.

Speaker C: Mhm.

Speaker A: And so let me just. You've mentioned something in the body. Um, here's an interesting One of the 12 claims I worked on. I've got this position paper I've written about this stuff because it's, I'm actually working on it as a like small book. Um, and one of them was this. Uh, the body often registers relevance before conscious explanation.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: And I think that's what you were saying is like it's sub, um, language. It's sub thought. It's, it's. The body can tell you something before the brain can catch up.

Speaker C: Yeah. The, the body spotted there was a culture fit problem on our deal. Before I could even articulate there was a culture fit problem in our deal.

Speaker A: So I mean. Okay, that's just fascinating. Let me, let me give you. Yeah, let me give you another one. Um. Feelings are embodied early stage. This goes on with what we just said. Often pre verbal information about what matters, what feels safe, what feels threatening, what value violates a value, what would create relief, what deserves further attention in financial planning. This matters because many important decisions are not solved by information alone. They're made in conditions of uncertainty, ambiguity, trade off identity, family history, fear, hope and meaning. A spreadsheet can tell us what might work, but the body will often tell us what matters. How do you respond to that?

Speaker C: A spread. I'm kind of clicking to the last part. A spreadsheet might tell us, was it what's possible, what might work? What might work?

Speaker A: A body will tell. The body will often tell it often. And this is the kind of key is like it's. Yeah. Uh, often. Right. Will tell us what matters.

Speaker C: Yeah. I again in my final in my feelings are data, data, data, lens like. Right. I. Almost everything we do and talk about in financial planning is some version of trade offs.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker A: It's, it's like no pure right answer. Yeah.

Speaker C: Right. You know, it's, it's, it's safe for the present versus save for the, you know, enjoying the present versus enjoy in, in the future. It's you know, see the kids, uh, uh, through college versus my, versus how I'm saving for my retirement. Right. Just like there's a never ending series of Trade offs. Because literally we're managing a scarce resource. So there has to be a trade off. Uh, a yes to one thing is a, is a, uh, is a no to something else. And so I mean to me any version of financial planning is sort of two elements where we're, we're trying to analyze what happens with the current path or if we do something else right, you know, what if scenarios and the like. And then we're trying to make some value decision about which one of those is actually better for us given our circumstances and our preferences, which is all the. You know, my economist friends will, Will, Will note, you know, I, we can, we can totally model quantitatively with a utility function. It's just no human being knows how to express their actual utility function in quantitative terms that you can um, plug uh, into a formula. So instead we're like vaguely feeling around in the dark. Feeling around in the dark, trying to figure out how to weigh these, weigh these trade off decisions. And to me what, what sticks in that? I mean, I guess from your quote, I, I don't really see them as like an either or, where we're weighing on what, what the analysis says versus what the feelings say. The feelings are just one of the inputs when you're trying to make the value decision of like okay, but am I going path A or path B?

Speaker A: That's right.

Speaker C: I'm going to choose the one if scenario or not. I can't make that choice without. And there's not one. I mean sometimes they're literally just like uh, a. Mathematically this tax strategy will be better than not doing this tax strategy. But when you get to the real financial planning choices, which are choices, it's not a quantitative right answer. It's a, it's a values trade off answer. And so anything that gives you input on the trade off is probably unhelpful input.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's just super important. And here's the, um, let me, I'll give you, I'm going to just give you two more and then we'll kind of like. I want to talk about practical bits for just a. Pete.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: Like without feeling, thinking it's worse. That's, that's, that's one of the claims. Good thinking is not emotionless thinking. Good thinking includes well interpreted emotional information. Right. So that, and then here's Feelings function as information. Feelings are a sort of information when making judgments.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: Should we listen to feelings or ignore them? That's not the question. The question is what is this feeling information about which is kind of what you were saying on your, like, hunt.

Speaker C: Yes. Yeah. I'm like, why is this bothering me? Like, why? I'm feeling some hesitation for this decision. Let's pause for a moment here. Why am I, like, why does it not feel good? Why is the gnome poking right now?

Speaker A: The smurf. The smurf.

Speaker C: Just like that. One long finger is like, that's right. Why is the gnome poking? But then that. That's what takes me down the rabbit trail of really just trying to sit down. Or I usually. I mean, very real. Like, I'll take a walk.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: They get fresh air and just like, what. What is bothering me about this? Like, there's something there. And if I can pause enough and focus on that, usually I can get whatever the thing is to surface from unconscious to conscious. Like, if I. Yeah. Uh, dwell on it enough, it'll. Whatever.

Speaker A: The.

Speaker B: The.

Speaker C: Eventually the mind surfaces the thing. But I. But I have to create some space for it, which starts with acknowledging and holding space for the feeling. Okay. I woke up this morning, it's not feeling good. Good. Like something's not right.

Speaker A: So good. The. The. The. The, um. The feelings might be about the decision. I thought this was. I. I worked on this quite a bit. The feelings might be about the decision, but it might also be about hunger, fatigue, shame, social comparison, old family stories, recent market news, or fear of disappointing someone. So the skill is not necessarily trust your feelings, which you've been pointing at. The skill is interrogate your feelings.

Speaker C: And, like, it sounds more aggressive, but. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker A: Try to under. I mean, if they try to understand them, like, pay. Pay attention to them, include them in the analysis, like, it's not necessarily trust them.

Speaker C: Yeah, It's.

Speaker A: It's like, say, oh, interesting. What's that all about?

Speaker C: Well, because I. I guess because the distinction for me, I mean, look, sometimes.

Speaker A: Sometimes you're just wondering.

Speaker C: Usually the good feeling means yes. Sometimes the bad feeling means no. Sometimes the bad feeling means there's just some issue or part of this that I had not fully addressed or solved for that I just need to bring back to the conversation.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker C: I think that's why I'm like, uh, you know, if the gut is yes, I'm okay to go with yes. If the gut is no, I'm not necessarily a no. It's probably a fairly likely no, but I.

Speaker A: Further consideration.

Speaker C: Often it's a deal. Killer thing, but maybe it's a solvable thing, which you're right. I guess I wouldn't use the word interrogate, but sure, yes. Then I'm like explore. I'm interrogating, I'm exploring for, uh, like, what's the thing? And is it really a deal killer or is it something that could be solved or is it something else entirely that's just running in parallel?

Speaker A: Yeah, this. Let's, let's just. As we wrap up, let's talk about like, this is lit like goosebump territory for me. I get so excited about this idea. And here's the reason I feel so strongly about it is because it turns out we humans are not very good at this. If feelings are that important. And I think getting increasingly important, I think as uncertainty ramps up, feelings actually get more important and being practiced.

Speaker C: Yep.

Speaker A: At sorting out what it feels like. And what I'm finding from my book tour is like, I literally. I had a, I had, I had a conversation on book tour with somebody who I'm just going to call Jimmy. It's definitely not his name. Jimmy was literally like, I don't know what you're talking. I don't even know. I was like, what does, what does it feel like when a decision. He was like, I had a bunch of anxiety around the decision and I was like, okay, great. How did you know that? He's like, I was just anxious. Like, what did it feel like? I can't even describe. I don't even. I, uh, was like, where in your body? He's like, I can't. And I was like, I know, I'm just saying. And I'm picking on. What did I call him? Jimmy. I'm picking on Jimmy because we're all Jimmy. And I think our ability to do that ourselves will translate in our ability to help clients do it. And so let's just practically, for a minute, let's just do like, like two minutes on how do you see this, like imagining a client who's like, you know. And you even said a couple of these, like all the numbers were good. You know, all the, all the, all the things said that this was a. It looked good. You used the word. It looked good on paper.

Speaker C: Mhm.

Speaker A: But I made a different decision. Like, how do we. Where does that show up with clients? How do we get better at it? How did you get better at it?

Speaker C: Um, the place. It shifted to me and I mean, frankly, if I. This can crop up anywhere from clients to teammates to leadership with your team to direct reports. If you're a management, uh, uh, role, there is actually a language shift that I think I've really just started to bring in over the past year or few in My conversations that um, you know, if we're talking about a new plan, a new project. Right. You know, a, ah, what if scenario with the client. Right. I, I would ask something like, you know, like, you know, so here's, like, here's option B. What do you think of that option? Like, how does that seem to you and, and have whatever, whatever conversation ensues. And the language shift for me is I've actually gotten much more, uh, uh, much more intentional to, to ask or say how does, like here's, here's, you know, here's the option, here's the new thing. How does that feel to you?

Speaker A: So good. Yeah.

Speaker C: And just using the word feel because. Yep. Um, sometimes, at least more often if we create a safe space for, I mean someone will say, I, I don't know, it doesn't feel great. I'm feeling concerned, I'm not feeling good. Like if there's a negative feeling, like a negative feeling can get espoused. If you created a space for it and use the word, how does it feel to you? Not great. Can you tell me more about that? Well, I don't know. I'm not sure. It just doesn't feel great. I'm like, cool. Can we just hang out here for a moment and try to get to.

Speaker A: What if we sleep on it?

Speaker C: What that, what that, what that is. I'm not even in the sleep on a phase. I mean like in real time. You're already expressing something doesn't feel right. So I'm not blowing off or discounting that. I'm like, I actually want to elicit that because your gut, your gut is weighing in with some data that your brain hasn't caught up on yet. So can we actually now hang out for a moment? Like what doesn't feel good? Like, tell me more about that. What, what, what feels off?

Speaker A: Can we. I think it would be really good to not, uh, overcomplicate this and just end right there. Like, I think this. To me that's a very practical thing. That would be. I would love to hear from any of our listeners if you just go try this next time. Just as you present options, trade offs, just try, here's the option. And don't. You don't need. Look, I was expecting you to say that before, like, you were like, here's option A. And I thought the words that were going to come out of your mouth were, has it. I think we probably do this more than we think we do because it's just, it's like a normal bit of language. We just don't mean it.

Speaker C: I, I realize like my, I don't know why or where I got this. I would often ask, how does that seem?

Speaker A: Yeah, Yeah.

Speaker C: I don't know what book or whatever it is that I read when I was young that like clicked that particular, uh, phrase, but what do you think? And how does that seem? Were words that I just, I realized I used a lot. They were pattern words for me. And I've been trying to force myself to start asking, how does that feel?

Speaker A: Let's that try that at home. Like next time you have a client meeting and you've got options. It could even be like prospect being, hey, should we meet again? How does that feel? But I love the idea of like we're trying to make a decision. There's a spreadsheet, we've talked about it and we say, hey, what do you think? How does that feel? Mhm. And just listen to that. Like, it doesn't, that does not feel odd to me though. That doesn't feel, I don't think, I don't think a client would be like, what do you mean? How does it feel? Like, I just think if you were casual.

Speaker C: Yeah, in the moment, I know it works fine. But, but I mean, I think it's why I liked this theme as you kicked it off. Because I'm. I don't set that up because I'm trying to get a gut feeling. Thumbs up, thumbs down decision. I say it because if you say it doesn't feel good, I want to know why. Because that's the actual conversation. Like there's.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker C: There's some other factor in the room that's weighing on the decision that we haven't voiced yet, ostensibly. Because if you told me I really hate blank, I wouldn't have presented this as an option. So if you're feeling not good, there's some other input to this process that you didn't actually articulate. Like, it's cool. I'm not gonna take it personally. As we've done on prior episodes, I'm now basically convinced. Like all clients lie about their goals when they first tell me. Not because they're trying to be receptive, because they don't know themselves fully yet. So I never believe them. But in that, in that same vein, like, I'm hunting for more inputs, I'm hunting for more data that wasn't brought originally. And how does that feel to you? I find surfaces that conversation more because if there's something we didn't include, there's a negative feeling in response to the feeling question and we can hang out there for a bit and try to unpack what doesn't feel good, what seems off. Right. Whatever words they use. Trying to.

Speaker A: Yeah, uh, yeah. And even.

Speaker C: Even.

Speaker A: And again, I don't really don't like. But even, like, oh, it doesn't feel good. Uh, like, I'm just like, I. I'm a nut case for this kind of stuff because I would just. I couldn't leave the room without saying, like, describe that for me. Like, what is, what does not feel good. And, um, and all we're doing there is teaching people to slowly start recognizing what the body, how the body communicates to them. Because it turns out it's different for different people. But let's not overcomplicate. Just go try inserting how does it feel? As part of your process and send us an email and send Michael an email and tell us how it goes.

Speaker C: I'll forward them all to carlis.com and I'll just set up an auto forward to Carl.

Speaker A: That's perfect. That was amazing, Michael. Thank you.

Speaker C: Awesome. Thank you, Carl. Thank you.

Speaker A: I feel much better.

Speaker C: You feel better? I'm so glad.

Speaker B: Want more from the guys with a Sharpie and a spreadsheet? Subscribe to the podcast on your favorite app so you don't miss a minute. And if you're interested in going even deeper, be sure to check out Carl Richards@realfinaladvisors.com and stay on top of the issues that matter most to the financial planning industry by visiting Michael Kitces@kitces.com thanks for joining us on Kitces and Carl, and we'll see you in our next episode.