[00:00:00] Dylan Bain: We’re saying goodbye to the rigid numbers and strict budgets and putting relationships back at the heart of personal finance. This is more than a podcast. It’s an invitation to reimagine your money story and journey with us through a landscape of intuitive strategies and abundance. Join a community that nurtures transformative financial mindsets.

[00:00:25] Welcome to intuitive finance. I’m your host, Dylan Bain.

[00:00:37] It’s March of 2015, and I’m sitting on the floor of my kitchen, just completely drunk out of my mind. My principal had called me into her office and asked me to change grades so we could maintain a graduation rate and I refused. And then she reminded me that contracts for next year hadn’t come out yet and that maybe I should go home and think about what kind of man my daughter needed me to be. And I made a lewd suggestion to her that marked the end of my teaching career. It was it. Was over. I walked out of her office, almost shell shocked at what I had said, knowing that I had functionally quit my job with no real backup plan, and I didn’t know exactly what to do.

[00:01:16] I had a wife and a daughter to support, and now I was going to be without a job. I was terrified. And what was even more is that question she asked me, what kind of man Does your daughter need you to be was haunting my footsteps, and then I’m home, and I’m putting my daughter to sleep. She’s on my chest.

[00:01:42] I’m breathing slowly as she’s rocking off to sleep. I’m holding her, I’m holding my child, the future in my arms. And all the things my principal said and all the worries that I had had fell away because the type of man that she needed in that moment was her papa, her father. Her sense of safety. She didn’t care that I was a teacher.

[00:02:12] She didn’t care that my principal was terrible. She didn’t care that after I got her to sleep, I was going to go downstairs and drink a lot. She cared that her papa was there. She cared that I was there and that’s what kind of man she needed me to be. A man who had access to his heart, enough to be able to relax so that she can feel safe in this world.

[00:02:36] That’s what kind of man she needed me to be. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I tell that story because it’s such a turning point in my life. And this is the turning point for the podcast. This is the first episode of the human revolution. I’ve been podcasting now for almost two years, been financial coaching for five.

[00:02:54] I’ve been men’s coaching for the last 18 months. And one of the things that I see so frequently is that people will always come into the coaching practice and they’ll say, I have a tax problem. I need to figure this out, or I need a budget. I need more discipline. And in the men’s space, it’s always, I just want to have better relationships.

[00:03:14] I feel lost. I feel disconnected. I feel like I’m behind. I feel like I’m isolated. And when I sit back and I reflect on all of those different experiences, the common thread that seems to be going through all of them is this idea of humanity. Everything that they’re saying, this connection from what, from other people, they feel behind. Why? Because society says X, Y, Z, but they’ve made choices to live their life. They think they have a tax problem, which is entirely made up by society. When the real reality of the situation is they probably have an income problem, and if they don’t have an income problem, well, then it’s probably an expense problem.

[00:03:55] Trying to fix either one of those two things requires healing the emotional component of the money. There are bigger things at play. There are deeper currents. And so I’ve been thinking about this for a long time and it’s occurred to me, the thing that’s causing the suffering, the thing that we’re missing is the human element.

[00:04:15] We design housing developments, but when you actually look at it, like if an alien came down and looked at a suburban housing development and you asked the alien, what was this build for? They would tell you the car. So much of that development is not at a human scale. It’s at a car scale. The suburbs are car dependent and they’re isolating their little boxes.

[00:04:42] There’s no community and Americans, and Canadians this applies to you as well, like, stop and think about this. When you go to vacation in Europe and you look around and you’re like, Oh, this is great. There’s cafes and there’s people and there’s walking around. The thought that, that you have is, wow, this is really nice. I don’t know why I feel so at peace here, but the thought you need to be having is why is it we don’t have this at home? Why did they do that and we did the suburbs? And the answer is it’s complicated. But the bottom line of all of that complexity is that one is at a human scale, the other one is at an industrial scale.

[00:05:22] And we used to have those here in North America. We used to have those communities, and in some places we still do. And in other places we’re starting to realize, oh hey, we need to have these. The human centricity of it all. If the humans are malfunctioning, it’s a result of the things around them. What is A human, what does it mean?

[00:05:44] We talk about culture, we can talk about connection, we can talk about a sense of belonging. But to me, it really comes down to, if I look at it and I say, okay, humans organize themselves into cultures, and then as they technologically evolve, they turn into societies. So the core of the human is the culture in which they exist in.

[00:06:05] So, when we’re thinking about this in terms of like, what does it mean to be human? Well, the human Let’s just look at what humans have always done. What are the major things that when we look at a community of humans, a culture that we comment on? Well, the first one is food. Like, if I ask you, hey, what’s your favorite type of food?

[00:06:24] You’re not gonna tell me a dish, typically. You’re going to tell me a genre. Oh, I really like Thai food. Oh, I love Italian. And maybe there are crazy people out there who are like, I like English food and we just feel bad for them. But the point being is that this food, the way that we feed ourselves is a cornerstone of our own humanity.

[00:06:46] And there’s more to say on that here in a second. But let’s just move on to the second one. The second pillar is relationship. How do humans exist in relationship? And this is what kind of interesting because if you think back, they think about a table of people eating in various cultures. And you can see this in cinematic depictions, especially if you’re looking at movies from that came out in like the 1960s and seventies, they’re depicting things that the people who made those movies actually experienced.

[00:07:16] But you go in and there’s all, everyone’s around the dinner table. And there’s, there’s a, there’s, Oh, Hey, it’s, you know, it’s Johnny, Johnny, come on in and tell that story again, right? Like there’s a relationship. There’s a kinship that’s going on there. Yes, they’re breaking bread, but there is a way that they’re relating to each other.

[00:07:33] There’s a way that they are meeting each other as people and different cultures do this in different ways. If you’ve been to a place that’s very mosaic, like gear up, you’ll see this in many different ways of how they greet each other, how they, they interact with each other, how they greet strangers.

[00:07:52] There’s a relationship with themselves. There’s a relationship with the community. There’s a relationship with the culture. There’s a relationship with the history. There’s a relationship with the environment. All of these cultures have these in spades for the most part. And when I lived in Southeast Asia, Taiwan specifically, this was one thing that I saw all the time.

[00:08:10] Like the way that they raise their children, the way that they, we used to kind of joke that it’s a free range kid environment, but that’s actually because the entire community views the children as part of the future. And so there’s a relationships that go in there that are distinctive to these human groups but they all have some common pieces. Heart is another one. And when I say heart, I’m talking about ourselves, our inner life and our ability to express that they’re the things that are our truest desires, the things that are intimate to us. Now, certain cultures have different ways of expression, right?

[00:08:48] We’re all familiar with the stoic German, but there are plenty of places where you go and the men are much more forward, or the women are much more forward, or things are more fluid. They grieve in different ways. They laugh out loud. That’s all about music. Like there’s an expression of art, almost an artistic expression that goes and weaves its way through these human Experiences. And then lastly is lifestyle, the way in which we live our expectations as people, the way that we organize ourselves and organize our communities, those lifestyle pieces. And all four of these pillars used to be based on the environment in which humans found themselves.

[00:09:33] So, like, one of the things that I think is interesting and I am by heritage, Irish, I wouldn’t say that I am Irish cause I’m not, I’m an American, but I am by heritage Irish. And so the stereotype, you know, if you go back and you read a lot of the, the anti Irish propaganda in the United States, they would say, Oh, well, you know, the Irish are really lazy.

[00:09:54] They’re more interested in drinking and they’re more interested in playing music and dancing and all those other terrible, terrible things. But then when you think about it, most of them were potato farmers. They did potato farming, they did raising of sheep and livestock and that type of thing. And one of the things that’s interesting about that is there are periods of hyper intense work that goes on to produce those things.

[00:10:18] But the majority of the time, like, the potatoes are growing and the sheep are doing what sheep do. That’s it. And so if you’re coming out of an industrial society where we have shifts in a factory, and you’re expected to be, you know, you wake up at dawn and you’re in the factory an hour later, and you stay and you work and you work and work.

[00:10:36] And then, you know, when the sun is going down, you go home. This is going to look weird to you, right? But that’s because you’re coming out of different environments. The foods that you have access to, the way that you relate to each other, the way that you’re expressive, the The way that you’re living your life was dependent on the environment, but it’s not anymore.

[00:10:56] It’s not anymore because we’ve mastered the idea of global commerce. It’s not that way anymore because we’re able to, for basically free, ship something from the United States to India, to Vietnam, to China and the back of the United States at a low, low price that you find in a Walmart. We can bring everything to us.

[00:11:19] I live in Denver, Colorado, and there’s pomegranates in the grocery store and they’re not from here. So I now have access to different foods, which is great and wonderful, entirely based on finances. So when we’re looking and asking ourselves, what are humans? Well, we’re humans are group that creates a collective culture.

[00:11:41] And that culture is based upon food, relationship, harp, and lifestyle. And those pillars are sitting no longer on the environment, but on our finances. And when I look around and I’m in the midst of coaching, I find That people are suffering because of this. If you look at male rates of suicide, their deaths of despair, one of the things that’s been very interesting when you start looking at male suicide rates is that the majority of the men who are killing themselves are not killing themselves due to mental illness or depression, but because they don’t see a way out of their situation, that’s a death of despair. That’s horrible. That’s a sign that society is somehow malfunctioning. We’re more connected than ever. I mean, I’m talking to an entire audience of people, most of whom I’ve never met. That’s a high level of connectedness.

[00:12:35] I have a supercomputer in my pocket at all times. I can post things on Instagram and potentially reach millions of people. We’re more connected than we ever have been, and there’s less connection than there ever has been. Everything has become superficial and washed out. We feel like we’re behind constantly because, well, there’s that 20 year old who lives in Spain and claiming that she’s got the eight figure coaching practice, or we’re seeing the guy who who’s like, Oh, I’m homesteading out here.

[00:13:07] Uh, yeah, I’ve got my 40 acres and the mule, and I’m just making my way through it with this homesteading up here on Instagram. There’s no real connection, but we are connected. It’s superficial. We don’t know anything about these people. We’re longing for something that is raw and authentic. We’re dying for it quite literally.

[00:13:29] Now you look at the four pillars, food, relationship, heart, and lifestyle. Our current situation is that our food is industrial. Our relationships are transactional. Our hearts are suppressed and our lifestyle encourages isolation and illness. And that is terrible. We are suffering because of it. If we want out, it’s time that we need to reclaim our humanity, reclaim what it is to be human, to generate connection again, to start looking for the things that are raw and authentic, that create relationships.

[00:14:08] We should be demanding in our world, food that is nourishing relationships that are intimate hearts that are expressed in lifestyles that encourage connection and health. And this world is possible. When people start to go through this process, often it starts with a spark in one of those areas. And I’m overweight and I don’t know what to do.

[00:14:29] Okay, cool. Let’s start talking about food. Relationships. I don’t know why my wife and I are on the rocks. Okay. Hey, let’s talk about it I feel so disconnected from myself. Well, your heart’s not expressed. Let’s work on your heart. I feel lonely Yes, you live in a box in the suburbs and you get in another box that then transports you to a third box where somebody milks you for financial gain and then you reverse the process and then spend your time on Netflix.

[00:14:57] Your lifestyle is encouraging a lack of connection and people are profiting off of that. And the lifestyle also doesn’t include a lot of steps. So your health is going to seed. We deserve food that is nourishing, relationships that are intimate, hearts that are expressed and lifestyles that encourage connection and health.

[00:15:14] We deserve that as humans. And at the base of all of it is our personal finances. The number of times where I have successfully coached somebody to take control of their finances in a human centered relational way, and that it’s led to them suddenly discovering a love of cooking. This came about because they’re looking at their finances and saying, well, hold on a second. I spent a lot of time dining out, but I really like dumplings. I should just learn how to make dumplings. And then pretty soon what’s happening is they’re making dumplings. And if you ever made dumplings, like dumplings are extremely labor intensive and yet they’re great to do with friends. Thanks. And so I get a bunch of the friends over and we’re going to do a dumpling party.

[00:15:57] And, oh, look what just happened. We started creating relationships. Now we’re laughing and talking. And, and eventually somebody says, Hey, what are your hopes for the future? And now we start expressing our hearts. And we’ve begun to create a lifestyle that creates connection and health. You can kind of see how this goes.

[00:16:17] I’ve talked about food being industrial before on the podcast, specifically the last episode that I did, link to that in the show notes, but what’s super interesting about that is that we don’t think about it. We don’t ask the questions going back to the European example. So many people that I know have gone to Europe and they marvel at the walkable communities and oh, there’s everyone’s so friendly and everyone’s so nice.

[00:16:41] It’s hard to hate people you see every day when you are walking at a human scale and running into other humans, it’s hard to hate them and feel separated from them. If nothing else, all have the love of that corner bakery in common. You immediately start establishing common ground, but when you’re trapped in a box out in the middle of nowhere, and you are entirely taking in all of your fake connection through a digital device.

[00:17:09] It suddenly becomes real easy to feel very isolated, like everyone’s out to get you. And so, like, when I look at, in the United States, how fractured we feel, how separated we feel, that seems and feels industrial to me. Because when I’m spending time with other people, even people who radically disagree with me on things like politics, I’m more apt to listen and to be empathetic, and I don’t hate them at all. But then I jump on Instagram and oh my God, this makes me feel like I need to grab the flag and let’s go like it’s insanity. But then you go over to these other countries and you see people and everyone’s so friendly, well, of course they are. This is how they live. It’s part of their lifestyle.

[00:17:52] It’s part of how they, uh, they’re in relationship with each other. It’s how they express their hearts. It’s through friendliness and courtesy. It’s a cultural thing. It’s a human thing. And what’s more is so many of those same people in the United States are gluten and dairy free. It’s becoming a thing.

[00:18:08] Gluten and dairy free. They go over there and they, they’re eating bread and croissants and ice cream and gelato and all sorts of stuff and they never have a single problem. That should give us pause. We should be stopping and going, wait, hold, stop, time out. What’s the difference here? Oh, yeah, they’re using a source for all their food, for their wheat and for their dairy.

[00:18:31] That’s what humans have been eating for thousands of years. And the United States and in Canada, we’ve industrialized it and it’s making us sick. If you, we want to get back to a more human centered way of being, reclaiming our food is a very core step of that. But of course that’s going to be a little more expensive than normal.

[00:18:54] And so you’re right back at the personal finances. When your personal finances are solid, those pillars can sit more solidly on a solid foundation. It’s easier to eat better when you have your financial house in order. It’s easier to date and be intimate. It’s easier to express yourself. It’s easier to live a lifestyle in which you can encourage connection and health.

[00:19:17] And of course, with the personal finance space, it’s very important that we do this from a human centric place, a relational place, an intuitive place. I’ve said this several times in many different ways, but there’s basically a polarity in the personal finance space. There’s the one where it’s like visualizations and mindsets and money is energy.

[00:19:39] It comes and it goes and it flows and oh, I have an abundance mentality. We’ve gone too far on one side, but then there’s the other side where we listen to radio hosts who make their living by making fun of poor people and telling you that you’re bad, naughty, and wrong for buying these other things and you’re broke, you’re broke.

[00:19:56] They yell like, ah, stop spreadsheets are useful. I’m an accountant. I get it. And we have to use them in a way that’s actually very human centered. There’s a middle path here, and that’s the path that we’re going to walk on this podcast. My goal with this podcast is to bring those four pillars into accessibility for all of you.

[00:20:19] I’m going to help you learn about your food and your relationships and your heart and your lifestyles. I already started doing this with Intuitive Finance. So many of my guests touched on this. We had coach Josh Wood came in and talking about food and talking about lifestyle. We’ve had Traver Bohm and Jordan Gray talking about relationship and expression.

[00:20:37] We already have this base and now we’re going to continue it forward. I don’t want to leave you with this. If you’re struggling with this, if you’re looking at it and saying, Yeah, Dylan, I hear you. I see where you’re going with this. But it just seems too big. I want you to know, I got your back. This podcast is designed to have your back and we’re going to start small.

[00:21:01] We’re going to start real small and step by step. We’re going to build a revolutionary idea that puts the human in the middle of everything. And I’m looking forward to sharing this journey with you. Thanks for listening the conversation doesn’t end here Please share the show with friends and make sure you keep up with all the latest updates on Instagram and threads at the Dylan Bain And dive deeper into the world of finance with me at Dylan Bain comm where you’ll find insights resources and strategies to reimagine your money story.