Clint Murphy 00:03
Welcome to the pursuit of learning podcast. I’m your host, Clint Murphy. My goal is for each of us to grow personally, professionally, and financially, one conversation at a time. To do that, we will have conversations with subject matter experts across a variety of modalities. My job, as your host, will be to dig out those golden nuggets of wisdom that will facilitate our growth. Join me on this pursuit. Most of us want to live a life of meaning and purpose, but we let distractions get in our way. Whether it’s fear, technology, money, possessions, the opinion of others, it doesn’t matter. We let it crowd out what we know, we were put on this earth to do. Today I had the opportunity to talk with Joshua Becker, author of Things That Matter about overcoming distraction to pursue a more meaningful life. This is a conversation for anyone who wants to learn to let go of the distractions and zone in on what truly matters to them. I hope you enjoy. Joshua, welcome to the pursuit of learning. Where I’d love to start is for our listeners who don’t know about your past. Can you share with them a brief bio of your history? And what brings us to the conversation today, when most people may know you as the minimalist?

Joshua Becker 01:44
Yeah, sure how far back you want me to go?

Clint Murphy 01:48
However far you’d like.

Joshua Becker 01:49
Let’s see, I usually mentioned because I think it’s helpful. I grew up in a pretty typical middle class family in the middle of America, never eating at the fanciest restaurants in town, but never missing a meal along the way, lived a pretty typical suburban American life, the more I became a pastor after college, although I went to college for banking and finance, but decided to become a pastor instead, had a couple pay increases along the way, a couple moves along the way. Every time we moved, seemed like we gathered more stuff and bought a little bit of a bigger house. 15 years ago, I was introduced to minimalism by my neighbor. It was a Saturday morning, I was living up in Vermont, and I was cleaning out my garage, which ended up taking the entire morning sorting out all the dirty dusty things inside my garage, my son was five playing alone in the backyard. And it was my neighbor who introduced me to minimalism, I was just complaining about how much time and effort had gone into cleaning out my garage. She said, You know, that’s fine. My daughter is a minimalist, she keeps telling me I don’t need to own all this stuff. And there’s a pile of dirty dusty things in my driveway, things that I would have said weren’t making me happy, right? We all say I’m not looking for happiness in our possessions, the things we buy aren’t making us happy. But I have the corner of my eye, I saw my five year old son swinging alone on the swing set in the backyard where he had been by himself all morning long and suddenly realized that all the things I owned, weren’t just not making me happy. But all the things I own, were actually taking me away from the very thing that did bring me happiness, and meaning and purpose and significance in life. And I always think that’s the light bulb moment. That’s the light bulb realization where minimalism starts to make sense, where it’s one thing to say our possessions aren’t making us happy. But it’s another thing where we start to realize our excess possessions are actually taking us away from happiness and meaning and purpose. And so that’s the short version of 47 years of my life. How about that?

Clint Murphy 04:03
I love it. So the transition to Things That Matter, which is the book we’re going to be talking about today. You know, what jumped out at me is foundationally when you were at the conference called Start Finishing, the facilitator, Charles Gilkey said to you “close your eyes, and then answer this question. If you were to die today, what is the one project you would be most disappointed you weren’t able to complete?” You answered that question. “If I were to die today, I would be most disappointed. I never got to a chance to write the book I’ve been thinking about for a long time”, which is the book we are going to be talking about today. What was it when you did that exercise that made you realize Things That Matter was what had to get written?

Joshua Becker 04:56
Well, I had been writing about minimalism for a little over 10 years. And when I started looking at all the things that I had bought that I didn’t need, all the things I wanted still that I didn’t need and began looking at possessions in a new way. I was forced to wrestle with another question, which was, if I wasn’t going to go buy a whole bunch of stuff, then what’s the role of money in my life? Like, what’s the point of money if it’s not to go buy a whole bunch of things, and if I want to own less stuff, then I need less money to get by. So then I started wrestling with the idea of work, what’s the point of work if it’s not to make a whole lot of money to go buy a whole lot of things. And it was really interesting how deciding to own less, really forced me to question a lot of assumptions that I was making, on why we live and how to live and the purpose of living and all these things that everyone is so busy chasing and accumulating. And so I had written a lot about some of those other topics and some of the questions I was asking, and some of the things that I was discovering. Taking a step back before that Monday evening event, the weekend before I was speaking on a retreat in Northern California, I would always do a weekend retreat on minimalism and why I own less, how to overcome consumerism. Some of these topics, my Sunday morning talk, every weekend retreat was always about, okay, we’ve talked about minimalism and possessions for three sessions. Let’s talk now about some of the other distractions that can keep us from happiness and keep us from meaning. And so I would talk about the pursuit of money, the desire to be wealthy. I would talk about accolades, I would talk about leisure, I would talk about technology and just the distraction that it can be. And so I had just done this Sunday morning talk where I expand the idea of minimalism into all these other topics. And then that following Monday night, I’m at this seminar, and Charlie Gilkey asked, you know, what’s the one project you would most regret not finishing. And immediately a book based on this talk came to mind where I said, I like I really think the idea of minimalism expands beyond possessions. And there are other distractions that can keep us from meaning. And so that evening is where the book was born. And it was just a, I’d written about these topics on my blog, like scattered throughout over the years, but there was no one clear, concise argument, one clear concise book that could outlive me if I were to die. So that’s where it came from.

Clint Murphy 07:43
And so when we think about that, what it sounds like we’re looking at is, why am I here? What’s my purpose? What am I meant to be doing? And what are all the things that are getting in my way? What are the things that are distracting me? Or taking me away from focusing in on my purpose or mission?

Joshua Becker 08:01
Yeah, the way I frame it in the book is, how do I get to the end of my life with fewer regrets? How do I get to the end of my life, proud of the way I’ve lived? So much so the death isn’t something that I fear, death isn’t something that I can’t believe it’s already showed up? What did I do with my life? And how did it pass by so quickly, without me even noticing that it passed, but how do I choose what’s important? And then how do I recognize what’s distracting me from what’s important? And then how do I fight to overcome that distraction every single day so that I can live my life to the fullest every day, and reach the end with fewer regrets.

Clint Murphy 08:42
And so a quote that you reference that I’d love to read and dive into with you because the Stoics and their timeless wisdom had been talking about a lot of these great concepts for 1000s of years, and we get to plumb their knowledge. “It’s not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements, if it were all well invested. But when it is wasted in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constraint to realize that it has passed away before we knew it was passing. So it is we are not given a short life. But we make it short and we’re not ill supplied but wasteful of it. Life is long, if you know how to use it”. So what does that mean for you? And how did it not only influence the writing in the book, but how did it influence your life because you do know that a lot of what you’ve been able to accomplish is because you changed your life to live that way. So you were very focused on what you wanted to accomplish. And you were living a very purposeful driven life.

Joshua Becker 09:57
Yeah, trying to at least, hoping hoping that I can but yeah, there’s I mean, probably even a background to when I first read that quote, but I mean, the part that sticks out to me always the most is when Seneca says, “when life is wasted, in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constrained to realize that it passed away before we knew it was passing.” And I’ve always found a lot of road to rundown a lot to mine, in the phrasing heedless luxury and spent on no good activity. Because I mean, how much of the things that we buy, in many ways are just about luxury. I mean, it’s just about comfort, like the things that most of us are buying, has gone well beyond things that we need. And it’s things that we want, it’s things that we think will improve our lives, it’s things that we think will make us happier and more comfortable or more luxurious, or whatever it be like, I think a lot of the things we spend our money on, a lof of the things that we desire and chase and pursue is heedless luxury. And then he also says “no good activity”, which I think the first time you hear it, you think of watching television, playing video games, like, like just doing things that we know are time wasters. But for me, and that’s probably what I first thought of when I first read it. But the more I pursued minimalism, and the more I started wondering about even the role of money or the role of fame in our lives, like I go on to define in the book, those types of things as no good activity, like the the constant pursuit of wealth and the constant pursuit of accolades or agreed the pursuit of leisure as a lifestyle, which is a huge thing. And certainly in the US nowadays, I think that’s how I began to define it and see it. And I can just see how, when money becomes my greatest goal in life, and I chase it constantly, that I can get to the end of my life and wonder what happened to the time, like what happened with all the things that I actually want to accomplish? What happened with all the things that I really thought meaningful in life? Because I don’t think anyone, if you sit across the table from them and ask them, What do you most want to accomplish in your life, no one says, I just want to make as much money as possible. Well, maybe a few people do. But like most people in our deepest hearts, it’s loving people and making an impact in the world and being a good husband and father. And like that’s what we most desire. But for some reason, we spend our days chasing spending on no good activity, chasing all these things that that aren’t going to get us what we actually desire.

Clint Murphy 12:42
I mean, it’s an interesting one, as you said that it jumped out at me, we’ll often think as parents, there’s no more important mission for me, than making these two young boys the best men they can someday be. And yet to your point, I then go to work for 60-70 hours a week and don’t see them and don’t help them grow and not involved. Because I think that the pursuit of that money will allow me to buy them the things that will make them better, when in reality, spending 10 to 20 hours with them, talking to them, being beside them would probably be the best thing for their growth out of anything I could ever provide them.

Joshua Becker 13:23
Yeah, that’s a brilliant, perfect example. Or we get into this thinking where well, I’m just going to work hard, I’m just going to work really hard right now, so that I can have enough money. And then I can spend time with my kids, right? Like we sacrifice, we take on the new project now because we think that we’ll reach this golden dollar amount where we can finally just work 40 hours a week and spend the rest of our time at home. But as as we all know that you never get there, like another thing comes up and another opportunity comes up. And we just constantly fall into this thinking that we need more money to become the person that we actually want to be when we probably are already there.

Clint Murphy 14:03
And we’re definitely going to talk about that when we get to money. The One of the things you’ve done to help stop that for yourself is when you start every day, you use a declarative statement to say today I commit myself to and you choose something each and every day. What are some examples that you might use in your life? And how can our listeners use this in their life to start slowly moving themselves forward with just those first baby steps?

Joshua Becker 14:34
Yeah, the whole idea I learned from a pastor when I was in college, and he said that every morning, maybe sharing more information than any of us need to hear but he always said he did every morning in the shower, he would just say out loud today I commit myself to and then he would always finish today I commit myself to following God as best I can. And I really resonate with it. The idea that these are distractions that these are temptations that we never fully overcome. But we like we need to battle almost every single day is a reoccurring theme in the book. And so I start out with this idea of just setting our intention every morning, just reminding ourselves every morning, hey, this is what’s most important to me. And if you’re a man or woman of faith, then that might be what your declaration is. But it goes well beyond that. Maybe it’s just today I commit myself to being the best mom that I can be today, I commit myself to being the best neighbor that I can be. Today, I commit myself to focusing my day on whatever is most important to you. But what it does, is it, number one, it forces us and it can be the same thing every day. But it forces us at some point to articulate what is most important to me, like what like what do I want my life to be about, what would be a worthwhile pursuit with this day that I have in front of me. So it forces us to articulate that. And then number two, it’s just a like a centering moment, I mean, the world is going to be around us. Society’s going to be around us calling for our attention, calling us to focus on this or calling us to focus on that, telling us to buy this or buy that or the media will tell us to focus on this problem or that problem. Or, like we’re just going to get the television is going to tell us we need to watch this show or that show and like the world is constantly be clamoring for our attention. And so before that even starts, just saying, hey, this is what my day is going to be about.

Clint Murphy 16:40
And do you do that verbally? Or do you write that down as the focal point for your day,

Joshua Becker 16:48
I think that it would work either way. I don’t write it down. I say it. Someone once said ‘thoughts disentangle themselves when they’ve passed through the lips or the fingertips’. And so I think either one of them is helpful, writing it down or saying it out loud, I think there’s something more powerful than just thinking it in your head. When you do say it out loud, and you’re forced to articulate the words, you’re forced to write them down. I think either one of them can be helpful, but I’ve always been one to just say it out loud.

Clint Murphy 17:14
I love that quote, “thoughts disentangle themselves when they run through the lips or the fingertips”. That’s beautiful. So today, I’d love to discuss some of the distractions that you list and leave many of them for our listeners to go read when they read your wonderful book. And before we get into the distractions, I want to talk a little bit about the framework you suggest that the listeners use as they start to think about the distractions, which is at first, we’d be vigilant in self examination. Second, we verbally articulate what distractions are keeping us from our best work, from what we love most, from fulfilling our highest purpose. Third, we’d be diligent and intentional in removing these distractions. And then last, we remind ourselves of the value of doing the most important work. So how would you suggest people do that? Is that a journaling exercise? Is that a mental exercise? What does that look like when you’re sharing with people?

Joshua Becker 18:17
Shameless plug, I wrote the book in a lot of ways for that first step, which is to identify the distractions that that are keeping us from meaning. When I tell people the name of the book, Things that Matter, Overcoming Distraction to Pursue a More Meaningful Life, most people think to themselves, that is a book I need to read, because I spend way too much time on my phone. And I agree, technology is in the book, like we picture the distraction of social media, like we picture the ones that that are right in front of us. But then I think you start reading the book. And there’s a chapter on fear. There’s a chapter on regret. There’s a chapter on money. There’s a chapter on leisure and accolades. And I think it goes much deeper, into much deeper heart issues and heart motivations, then people think it’s going to when you first read the title of the book, and so in many ways, like I hope that there’s eight chapters in the book, and each one identifies a distraction, and then provides practical steps to overcome it. But man 90% of my vision for the book, 90% of my goal for the book was just to get people to think differently about some of these things, and maybe recognize, hey, maybe I am more motivated for money than I ever thought, I guess I hadn’t ever considered how regret or how mistakes in my past might be keeping me from pursuing meaning in my life. And so I think the book does a pretty good job of bringing up new distractions, explaining them, showing practical applications and examples of how they might get in our way and then challenging people to identify them in their own life. And I think that probably we all struggle with all of them to some degree. But certainly there are specific distractions that trip us up individually more than some of the others.

Clint Murphy 20:12
Oh, absolutely. And even within each of them, there are multiple different ways they trip us up. So for example, if we dive into fear, first, you list a number of fears that we may have. We could spend the entire conversation just talking about fear as a distraction. But if you were to say, what are two or three that seem most common to the people that I talk to, in the conversations that I have, and you did do a survey of people for the book to say, hey, how does this distraction come up for you, and polled people on certain things? What are some of the most more common fears that you see get in people’s way? And how do you usually suggest, well, how do you break through those two or three fears that are quite common for people to have?

Joshua Becker 21:03
Yeah, that’s a good question. You know, I always think there’s an interesting fear of, I’m afraid to pursue something new, because I’m afraid of losing what I already have if that makes any sense. My life is comfortable, my life is fine. There’s a lot of external things about my life that I look, that I like. If I were to leave my job that pays me well, to go work for a nonprofit organization to help solve a problem that I’m passionate about in the world, then that means I’m gonna have to give up a certain lifestyle, a certain way of living and so but maybe at the end of your life, you’re going to be more proud of the work that you did for the nonprofit than you did in the job where you’re making a ton of money, right? And you could stay in that golden handcuffs or sometimes silver is what I say, right? Like, we just get a comfortable life, and we’re not getting rich, but it’s just comfortable. And so the idea of taking less money to go do something that we think is more meaningful, or is going to make a bigger difference in the world might is a big step for people. That was certainly my story. I wasn’t getting rich as a pastor, but I had a pretty stable income and someone else was writing the check every single month for me, but I felt called to become a writer and speaker on minimalism and help people see how owning less can improve their lives and improve their lives. And so I went through about a almost a year and a half, two year process of like, okay, am I am I ready to make this change? Am I ready to make this transition? So that’s one that comes to my mind, certainly, because I went through it myself. There’s others, fear of failure, and sometimes even fear of success and fear of the unknown. And like, there’s a lot of different fears that they can get our way, fear of what other people are going to say like, there’s a lot of different fears that that can pop up. But in terms of overcoming it, I think that we take little steps. And we for me, it was literally math, it was like a sheet of paper of okay, if I’m gonna quit my full time job, my stable full time job and become a writer full time, how much money do I need to make in this new job? If we What are some of the things that we would have to give up in order to accept this new lower salary? How much money do we have saved? And how long would that last if everything fell apart. Literally, it was a sheet of paper and just looking at the numbers and thinking, You know what, I think this is worth it. This is worth me taking this step.

Clint Murphy 23:30
If you think about it, always, whenever we talk about this topic, it brings up the Mark Twain quote for me, “I’ve lived through some terrible things. And some of them actually happen”. Because we tend to look forward and we project the bad and you even had a stat that 85 to 90% of what we worry about never happens. And often that simple exercise of going to a sheet of paper and saying well what’s the worst outcome versus what’s the best outcome? When you actually start putting it to paper? You may realize that more often than not, there’s much more asymmetrical upside to downside. And if we take your example, Joshua, worst case scenario, wouldn’t you just become a pastor again?

Joshua Becker 24:17
Yeah, literally, that was the math. It was like okay, I can probably, we’ve saved a little bit like four or five months of, I can live on savings and if nothing happens in four or five months, then I could just go back to doing what I was doing before Yeah, absolutely.

Clint Murphy 24:30
Yeah, and best case scenario, you live a life fulfilling what you believed was what you were put on earth to do. So we think about that how many people haven’t even done that simple exercise to say well wait a second if it was me you know, I’m afraid to quit my job as a CFO. I’m well paid I do well, in the fear is will I’ll lose my house. I’ll lose all my everything I’ve built, it’ll all disappear. But wouldn’t I just go back to being as CFO somewhere else if it didn’t work out. So why that fear? It seems like when you just shine that simple light, do that simple exercise that we should be able to overcome this one.

Joshua Becker 25:09
Yeah, I agree. And certainly there was an aspect of me discovering minimalism, a decade or so ago, and realizing, hey, I don’t need as much money to support my lifestyle, as I thought I did. We moved into a smaller home and we’re happier, we were buying less stuff. And we’re happier. Like, I saw how downsizing my life freed me up to do other things that were more important. And so my baseline number of what I thought I needed to get by had been changed over that past decade, which certainly made it easier. And it’s probably one of the reasons that some of these life paths and life realizations kind of build on each other to get to the point where you need to be.

Clint Murphy 25:10
Absolutely. And so we can jump forward to that, and we’ll come back to one of the other ones. But when you think about money, it seems to be one of the greatest stressors for most Americans, I think you list 70% of Americans are stressed about money. And in most cases, we don’t feel stressed because we don’t have enough, we feel stressed because we simply want more. And I think the quote you had was Rockefeller, when asked how much money is enough? His answer was “just a little bit more” than I was talking with someone at work yesterday, I uses that quote, because it’s so powerful. We’re always just looking for that little bit more. So why do you think that so many of us are stressed about money and distracted by it? And is minimalism the way out? Are there other ways we should be thinking about money and reframing our thinking, to overcome what should be such a simple distraction?

Joshua Becker 26:53
Well, I think money becomes such a stressor in our lives, the way I describe it, is because we keep looking for money to provide something that it’s never going to provide. And rather than realizing I’m looking in the wrong place for these things, we just think to ourselves, I just haven’t reached the right amount of money. So for example, happiness and security are the two that I usually think about, and we have a certain level of money in our lives. And we don’t feel secure with, I think the number in America is up to close to 90% now of people say that they have financial related stress, like in the wealthiest nation, in the history of the world, nine out of 10 of us don’t think we have enough money. So we have a certain level of money, we have a certain level of happiness, and we feel a certain amount of security around it. But we wish we had more, like we think more money would make us happier, we think that we should feel totally secure with the amount of money that we have in our bank account. And we know that we don’t have it. So the answer is just a little bit more. That’s what Rockefeller said, like how much money, just a little bit more, I think they asked people with a net worth over $2 million if they had enough money. And the average answer was I just need 25% more, and then I will have enough. And so we pursue it and we chase it and we get to the income level that we want, or we get to the net worth that we want. And we reach this new level. And we don’t feel any more secure. We don’t feel that much happier with our lives. And so rather than thinking, and maybe I’m looking for happiness in the wrong place, we just think, Oh, I just need more money. I just need more money, and then I’ll feel secure, and then I’ll feel happier. So I think this is where a lot of the stress comes from. I mean, there is just a reality that we need money to survive. But most of us are making enough money to survive, like our stress isn’t coming, for most people, our stress isn’t coming from I don’t have a roof over my head. I don’t have enough clothes in my closet. It’s we can’t park our cars in our garages, we have so much stuff inside of it. We’re looking forward to provide those things that it’s never going to provide. That’s how I see it.

Clint Murphy 29:12
When you talk about that two things come up for me. One is the Dalai Lama quote where he talks about the fact that we chase money and sacrifice our health or happiness… to go down the list and then we spend all of our money to get our health, etc back And, so that’s one and the second is, and I’d love to get your thoughts on it because I reference it on the podcast a number of times, I’ll call it the Kardashian trap. And I usually use the Kardashians as my example not because I have anything against the Kardashians. They’re fabulous. They’ve done an amazingly intelligent job at what they do. But the fact that we live a life where we no longer compare ourselves to our past, I tried to say to my family, for example, when they tell me how bad life seems to be. By any measurable account, every single one of my siblings, my parents, are living a life 10 times better than when I was a child, without a doubt. But what they’re not doing is living a life as good as the Kardashians. They’re not living a life as good as some of their friends that they see on Instagram, or on other forms of social media, where everybody only puts their best life, no one puts the fight with their spouse or that disagreement with their kids or, you know, the bad things that are happening in their life. Very few put those on social media. So how much of our desire for money and desire for more is simply, we’re playing a comparison game with the wrong people.

Joshua Becker 30:46
Yeah, and even at under that we’re, we think the Kardashians are incredibly happy. Or we think the Kardashians never worry about money, right? Like we think they’ve got it made, and they love every day of their life, and they’re never stressed about money. And if I just had that level, then I would feel that way. That’s kind of what what I was getting at. But when I was a kid, it was the lifestyles of the rich and famous, like, I don’t know when that show first started, right. But they showed you how everybody was living. And it’s true in a lot of ways television has, has done that, like it has shown it has. Number one, it is like allowed us to see how, how other people live. And it always presents it in a glamorous way. Like it never shows any of the downsides of living. That type of life never shows any of the disadvantages, never shows any of the stress or worries. You know what, there’s a brilliant study secret fears of the ultra rich or something, I forget the the exact title, although I might reference it in the book, and they interviewed a bunch of high wealth individuals, and are one of their greatest fears, or one of the greatest things they struggle with is loneliness. And it made this brilliant comment in the article. Because when you have that much money, you never know if people actually like you, for you, or if they just like you, because you have nice things and have a lot of money. And it’s it’s just interesting how you’d like you would never know that right? Like they would never present the Kardashians’ self doubt of you know, if these people actually like them, or if they’re just trying to get their money. But you’re right, like, if you just spend time in your neighborhood, like with just the people around you, you’re all buying the same type of clothes, and you’re shopping at the same type of stores, and everything feels just fine. And then you walk into a party with millionaires. And suddenly the clothes that you have felt comfortable in every day of your life suddenly feel drab and like not as well fitting and not as put together and your life was totally fine when you were just living it in the world that you were in. But as soon as you start comparing it to other people, you start to think you know what, I’m probably maybe I’m missing out on stuff, when in reality where we’re not

Clint Murphy 33:06
It’s 100% accurate. I often find myself in that situation, just in the line of business I’m in, the role that I’m in, the people that are in my circle, is people that are outside that circle may say to me, oh like to for all intents and purposes, I guess I would be wealthy. But to me, I feel often poor, because I’m in that situation where I’m seeing something much different than what I have. And for me, it’s like, well, no, I just live a normal, basic life. And they’re saying, Well, no, from our vantage point, you’re living a wealthy life. It’s just such a contrast of who you’re using, as your barometer to compare against. When you talked about the silver handcuffs or the golden handcuffs. I thought the analogy that someone used when you were at a conference on materialism in Poland, was even starker. And what they said when they invited you to give that talk was that in many ways, they thought materialism, held people captive, as communism did, that the communism they grew up with sought to destroy personal identities by force, whereas materialism does the same. But materialism destroys personal identity by choice, and that’s why they wanted you to come give that talk. What did that do for your mindset? And how did that resonate with you when they gave that example?

Joshua Becker 34:40
Yeah, the whole trip was enlightening in a lot of ways. And I went to speak in Poland and it was for a father’s conference. It was an organization and they were helping men know how to father because almost all of the father aged men in Poland grew up without dads because they were all fighting in the war. And so they didn’t even have a model of what a father would look like. And so at the Friday night banquet, they’re introducing some of the speakers. I was sitting next to my translator, and we had a conversation and like he mentioned into his teenage years, he would look outside his window, and there was a bread line right outside his window. It was after World War Two, but the USSR, the Soviet Union, held control over Poland till, I forget my dates, but I think like the 80s, or something like that, so Poland was this country that is emerging out of communist rule and into a free market capitalist system and the organizer asked me to come speak to father’s just on the dangers of materialism. And they were beginning to, he said, I could just see the signs of it. And he had a mentor who travelled to Western Europe at the time and came back and said, You know what, we’ve had our identity taken from us by force, but the Western Europeans, they’re giving up their identity by choice, just because corporations come along, culture comes along, society comes along and says, these are the clothes you’re supposed to be wearing, these are the fashions you’re supposed to have, these are the television shows, you’re supposed to be watching, and the movies you should be watching and the books you should be reading and just inundated with advertising and marketing. And everyone just becomes the same, doing all the same stuff, not by force. But by choice. That was a very fascinating weekend. And I hope that my words were well received, I think they probably were.

Clint Murphy 36:35
And when you think about what he was saying, you start to have an element of the matrix, if you will, we’re not plugged into a matrix. And at the same time, the news, television shows, social media, they are programming us to do what they want. The people that are creating these technologies, and even the foods, have PhDs in how to capture our attention. Or when you think of the food, in how to put the exact ingredients that make it almost impossible not to take that next chip. So how do we break out of that programming? Because I think for, for me personally, that’s a goal in life is to deprogram myself and to help as many other people out there as possible, realize that to some extent, they’re being programmed and, they can actually choose the program, but it’s a hard choice.

Joshua Becker 37:41
Yeah, the way I always said is the world hijacks our passions and directs them towards whatever they choose, whatever they want us to be thinking about, or spending our money on or spending our time on. The way I think we we program ourselves. Blaise Pascal once said, “all of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room by himself.” And I think we reprogram ourselves by withdrawing regularly from the noise and just sitting quietly with ourselves, whether it be half an hour, whether it be a full hour, whatever, whatever it might be on a regular basis, where we’re just sitting alone with our soul, sitting alone with our heart, sitting alone with our mind, and allowing it to slow down and not be taking enough time that we can remove some of the noise. And we can be reminded of what’s most important to us. And we can evaluate like, what am I spending my time on? What am I spending my money on? Why does this bother me so much? Why am I drawn to all these things? And is it healthy? Or is it not? Is it leading me towards meaning? Or is it heedless luxury and no good activity, and you’re gonna regret it at the end?

Clint Murphy 39:05
And so for that practice, that could be meditation, that could be prayer. What does that look like for you, Joshua? Is there a regular consistent practice that you have?

Joshua Becker 39:17
It is a practice that I wrestle with, is the best way to say there are times when I do it? Well, and there are times when I don’t do it well, and I wish it was easy enough for me to say, life always goes better when I do it. And so I do, but I struggle at times and times I do it better and times I don’t but it started in college, I had a personal development class, and we were required to spend 60 minutes alone, every single week. So that was the deal. One hour a week alone. It was no book, no music, no prayer list, no set of things that you are going to go through, no meditative practices or anything. Just sit quietly for an hour with yourself, and it was really hard at first you get better at it, the more you do it, and the first 15 minutes of the hour, your mind is racing and thinking about all the other things that you should be doing. And then the next 15 minutes, it starts to slow down a little bit more, and then you I think, reach this time where you’re a little bit more alone with yourself rather than thoughts. And so I did it very well, through college, I had another pretty good stretch of doing it, I’d say when I’m mindful of it, I can do it well, but I certainly have a, like a daily meditation or devotion, like faith based devotions that I do every single day and time in prayer every single day. But I think the the 60 minutes of solitude goes a little bit beyond that, and pays out even different dividends better than some of those things as well, or different, I should say, adds to it.

Clint Murphy 40:56
And people don’t realize that when they do brain scans and MRIs, and they look at people in prayer, what the people in that faith based prayer are getting as a result is very similar to what a monk is getting when they meditate. So that because what it really is, is that focused application of our mind. And so the meditation or the prayer is the practice in, you said it as you were describing that the mindfulness that you have, is the outcome from the practice of doing that daily prayer or meditation or are simply sitting alone with with yourself. So that’s, that’s wonderful for our listeners to be able to take away. The. So if we go backwards in the book, were flipping around, we’ve been flipping around through the conversation. One of the things that I probably talk about the most on this show, and it ties to the programming that we talked about, but it’s the programming from our childhood. And the Carl Jung quote that I often referenced is “until you make the unconscious conscious, you will forever be led by it and call it fate.” And it felt very similar to the quote that one of the people you featured in your book, Deanna, I believe it was when she said, “f we don’t identify ways in our past, where we developed unhealthy coping skills, find the courage to heal and forgive and learn new coping mechanisms, we can all be subjected to reacting out of the wounds of our past.” And so what did that look like for you? And what type of work do you do or do you recommend to people that they do to examine their past? And whether psychoanalysis, shadow work, or journaling? Or is there something else that people should be doing to get it that. well, how was I programmed in my childhood?

Joshua Becker 42:52
Yeah, whenever I speak on minimalism. Well, the short answer is, yes, I think journaling, I think just asking ourselves these questions is the first step. So when I speak on minimalism, and anytime there’s any opportunity for discussion, like roundtables, or whatever it might be, the first question I always ask is, how did your family of origin affect your view of possessions. And it’s very interesting, because two people can grow up in the same home and come up with sharply different views, like two people can grow up in a hoarder’s home, and one person wants nothing to do with it. And the other person, like just accepts it as a as a way of life going forward. And so the same childhood can result in vastly different outcomes. But they’re helpful to recognize and they’re helpful to see, hey, this is where this comes from, in my life, when it comes to money, when it comes to work, how much I value the work that I do. My grandpa was a pastor, and my dad was a banker. And so I went to college to become a banker. And then, towards the end, when I had a semester left is when I decided to become a pastor. And yeah, even in that, I think my dad found meaning in his work and still loved what he did. But some people you know, if you’re, if your family was always just you just go I have a friend who didn’t know what he wanted to do with his occupation. And his dad said, well, if you don’t know, he might as well pick a job that pays really well. And so he just picked a career that pays really well. And yeah, I think all these, a lot of conversations that I have in the book, probably every chapter, you could go back to and think okay, how did I see this in my family? What did I learn from parents or what I learned from my childhood or and how does this affect the way I live? And is it right? Is it a better way? Is it actually what they were doing or just what I thought that they were doing? I think that all these conversations are are helpful for sure. It’s actually interesting one of the things that I dedicated the book to my grandpa, but one of the things I didn’t expect, when I was writing the book was how I was personally forced to look back on my childhood and look back on the people in my life and trying to diagnose or break down like, Why do I think this way about money? Why do I think this way about work? Why do I think this way about possessions or fame? Where did this come from? Like who and sometimes it was a simple conversation that I had, I talked about a conversation I had in my driveway with a mentor of mine. And then I can go back to what I learned from my parents and other things. And so it’s always interesting. to It was an unexpected journey. The writing the book took me down than I expected actually going in.

Clint Murphy 45:51
Yeah I love that, because it’s almost a journey of the five why’s and you think, you know, a young colleague came up to me as an example, past colleague, and he knew I wrote a bit about financial independence and sort of breaking away from the system and pursuing your freedom. And we’ll talk about that later. Because not necessarily freedom to do nothing, or leisure, but freedom to pursue your purpose. And you saying, you know, I’ve got X amount of money, and I’m debating putting it into retirement savings, investing or buying myself a nice watch, which was a really interesting question. When he said, I want to talk about financial freedom. And that was the debate he was having. And my question to him was, why do you want the watch? And he started to give me, you know, the superficial level answers. It was, I said, no, no, go away and dig a little deeper. Why do you want the watch? Like what inside you? Is that watch going to fulfill and why do you think it will? In what is it in your childhood that made you think you’re, you’re lacking that, you know, like, did your dad not love you enough? And you feel like, if you have that watch, you’re going to all of a sudden feel like people will love you. Because, you know, just explore it, come back and let me know, you know, what’s the reason? And then, you know, if you want to buy the watch, buy the watch, but don’t do it mindlessly, do it mindfully,

Joshua Becker 47:15
Yeah, I have a friend of mine, and does pretty well financially. And he said that, like his journey in this was how it was expectations from his father, as to how he would spend his money. And for him, it was satellite radio in his car, he was driving his dad somewhere and his dad asked him to turn something on, a ballgame on or something. And he’s like, oh, I don’t I don’t get that channel. And his dad was like, well, you don’t make enough money to have satellite radio in your car. And like he was in that moment, where he realized, you know what, like, my dad has certain expectations that if you make a certain level of money, you’re gonna spend it in a certain way. And I’m not spending in a certain way, does he not think I’m successful? Or just, hey, this is just how I grew up that when you make enough money, you spend it on these things. And you said, it’s tough. Like, I have to battle it all the time. You know, there’s better ways to spend my money than satellite radio, but I’m always wrestling with well, maybe I should have it so that next time my dad rides in my car, it’ll go better.

Clint Murphy 48:22
He’ll think I’ve made it. Yeah, that’s beautiful. The. And so when someone comes to you, and they tell you that they can’t be minimalist, one of the quotes that you have that I loved was, well, “if you’re not minimizing your possessions, your minimum minimizing your money, time and potential”. So when you think of that, do you convey that to people just straight up and see how it lands? Or how do you work with that one? Joshua?

Joshua Becker 48:47
I’m trying to think if I’ve ever said that out loud. Maybe I have, maybe more in general conversations on social media. Well, if because someone will say, well, would everyone benefit from minimalism? Should everyone be a minimalist? And I always say yes, like, I think everybody should own only what they need to own. And then I get accused of being a communist. But anyway, that’s a completely different subject. But understanding of course, that looks different for everybody. A family of six is going to own something different than a single guy in his 20s. A dentist is going to own something different than a mechanic or a farmer or a writer or someone in the city going to own something different than lives out in the countryside. Like, we’re going to own different things. But what is the benefit of owning a whole bunch of stuff that that you don’t need, like everything we own costs money and takes time and energy and focus and is a distraction. And that’s kind of where I land on that. Well, I can never be a minimalist, and I’m like, well, well, you’re minimizing something in your life, like the reality is we all have finite resources. And if you’re not minimizing the possessions that you own then you’re minimizing the money and time and energy that you could be spending on something else by accumulating stuff that you don’t need. And I don’t know why that would be a benefit for anybody.

Clint Murphy 50:10
But that’s an important point right there. Because when we think about it, and a lot of people will talk about this, and it only really resonates when you sit down and go deep into it. But the only finite resource most of us have is our time. And it seems to be the one that we’re willing to sacrifice the most for things that we don’t need. So if we’re not living a bit more minimalist lifestyle, and for sure, I know, I’m no,t as I look at, the more I, the more we talk, I look in the room around me and think, gosh, what can I get rid of in this room? So why is it so easy for us to sacrifice our time?

Joshua Becker 50:44
Well, I think it becomes easy, because we’re fed 5000 advertisements every single day, telling us that, that our life will be better if we buy whatever they’re selling. And I think we unintentionally believe it and fall into that thinking, I don’t think if you, you know, on the game’s greatest goal in life, just own a house full of clutter and own a house full of stuff. But we just tend to gravitate towards that way of life because everyone else is doing it. Because that’s what we’re told to do. Probably some unhealthy motivations, that that we’re feeding in there, whether it be trying to impress other people, or jealousy, or envy or yeah, looking for happiness, and maybe we are looking for happiness in the things that we buy. So yeah, I think we just need to be constantly be reminded, I think, listen to a podcast like this or where you have a conversation and like, yeah, you know what, I haven’t been as intentional with my money as I could be. And good to be reminded of that, quite often.

Clint Murphy 51:45
Yeah, it really ties into some of the concepts that people write about and speak about in the financial freedom community, the intentionality of how you spend every dollar and really, you know, maybe having some people talk about like, no spend September. Like you may not spend other than necessities? You don’t, you don’t buy anything, and give yourself timelines to do that. I love that idea. The next one I wanted to dive in with you is one that’s getting me into some trouble, I realize, because I started on social media to promote the podcast, and then some social media started to grow. And there’s some enjoyment in that. And so you probably have an idea that I’m going to accolades now. And something that’s been a challenge you’ve realized for yourself at times. And so you tell us to ask ourselves two questions. And I really sat with these two, which were, why am I attracting followers? And how am I attracting followers? So what are those two questions mean for you? And how should our audience be using those to assess what they’re doing on social media,

Joshua Becker 52:52
Social media, the internet provides an amazing opportunity to bring about amazing good in the world and make a difference in the world and help people and reach more people than at any point in human history. So it is an incredible opportunity. But it can also be an incredible temptation along the way. And so same story, like I got started on social media to promote minimalism and to promote, you know, helping people own less and inspiring people to do that, and saw success there and saw growth there. And the question of why am I attracting followers, I think helps keep my motivation in line because I can do it because this is a great way to make a difference in the world and reach people with this message. Or this feeds my ego, this becomes something that I can turn into money, you know, like, what is the motivation for why I’m trying to attract followers. And then of course, the how piece comes down to, and there are a lot of ways to get famous online. And there are a lot of different ways to attract people. And sometimes I can do something online, that might not serve the greater good, but might get me a lot of followers. And so I just always want to be true as much as I possibly can to Hey, what I’m doing is bringing, I’m staying true to myself, I’m being the person that I am. I’m being honest with who I am. I’m not trying to become someone different online to attract people, because what’s the point of having people like the online version of yourself, if that’s different than the real version of yourself, eventually that’s going to come out and catch on to you and they’re all fake followers. They don’t actually like you. They like the persona that you’re trying to be, that you’re trying to be online. But second of all, there are just things that I can do to attract followers that that don’t move me towards a life of no regret, if that makes sense. So but I think that if we’re serving other people, if we’re healthy motivations, and if we’re trying to use it for good, then it’s an incredible opportunity to do that. It’s when we sacrifice some of that integrity or start chasing followers, as opposed to chasing the good that we can bring into the world, I think that’s when we begin to regret it. And it becomes a distraction.

Clint Murphy 55:15
That’s an important one that we often talk about with the concept of value over virality. It’s great when the value can mix with the virality. But, you know, even I find that myself in that trap once in a while, where, hey, growth is slowed down when I just talk about what I came here to talk about. So maybe I should write my thread on the 10 Google browser extensions that will make your life infinitely better and then it’s like, well, wait a second. That’s not why I’m here. I’m here to help people grow, I’m here to help people be better, achieve more and be financially free. If it doesn’t tie into those categories. Why am I writing about it? And that’s a great way to explore. It was to sit down and read those questions and go deep. So I definitely appreciated that one. And it seems like what you’re saying is that level of authenticity between Why did I originally come here? What’s my purpose? Who am I trying to help? And is my content staying in line with those so that I’m not becoming someone that I didn’t come here to be?

Joshua Becker 56:22
Yeah, am I sacrificing my purpose to get followers is not a winning strategy. You get a bunch of people that follow you for Google extension tips. And then you start talking about what you’re really passionate about. And that’s not why they’re following you. They’re like, I just want more Google extension tips. Yeah,

Clint Murphy 56:38
And so what are your main platforms of choice to spread your message?

Joshua Becker 56:43
Facebook, I use Facebook primarily, started a YouTube channel a couple of years ago, and I’ve seen some success there. And then I use Instagram and Twitter. But Facebook is what I use most intentionally and strategically. And so you,

Clint Murphy 56:57
I’m going to flip us over to one that you talked about earlier that you mentioned can get a lot of us in trouble, which was leisure being a distractor. And you pulled out a stat that absolutely mind boggled me was Stephen Nielsen total audience report from August 2020 said that the average time of US adults spent consuming media totaled 12 hours and 21 minutes per day. How is that even possible? How are we so glued to our devices that we’re consuming that much? And what is that doing to our lives? Like if we’re sleeping for eight hours, that’s 75% of our waking hours.

Joshua Becker 57:45
Yeah. I don’t know if we know yet what it is doing to us. I think in some ways, we’re all trying to figure it out, I give the illustration of fire. You know, fires first invented and here’s this tool for incredible benefit to boil water and cook food and forge steel. And like fire has this amazing capability for good for civilization. Meanwhile, it can burn down entire cities in a matter of minutes. And so there’s this this period of, of learning how do I use fire for good and not allow it to burn down everything along the way. And the Internet, technology, social media, it to me it all feels like that’s where we are with it. Incredible capability for good and also incredible danger if misused. And the problem with trying to figure it out is that as soon as you start to figure it out, it changes and it’s changing so rapidly that we’re all trying to catch up. I’m in my mid 40s. And I’m raising kids who grew up on social media, and I never had it when I was a kid. So it’s not like I can look back on my childhood at what I learned and what lessons I learned that work and stick and share those with my kids. Because I wasn’t there as a kid. It came about when I was adult. And so hopefully our kids are learning and taking some lessons and they’ll be able to parent their kids better than I am trying to make it up as we go. But I think that’s where we are. And my solution is number one, I think we look at the difference between creation and consumption. And we recognize hey, I can use technology for good or I can watch two hours of cat videos and waste two good hours of my day like what am I doing? Am I using it for good? Or am I letting it Am I controlling it? Or am I letting it control me? And I recommend taking a technology fast whether it be 14 days or a month or 40 days in any way that you can turn off Facebook for a month, you could turn off your video games for a month, you could turn off television for a month, you could turn off all your phone except for text and phone for a month like you. I think anytime that we walk away we come back a little more strategic and intentional.

Clint Murphy 1:00:02
And do you use some of the same techniques with your children as well to like a technology fast or or even having the conversation with them about the importance of being a creator versus a consumer? And how is that message received? Is it something that they then say, okay, I hear you, Dad, I’ll be a creator, instead of doom scrolling my Instagram, which seems to be what I, my high school son has already started.

Joshua Becker 1:00:26
No, I’ve never forced the technology fast upon them, it’d be an interesting experiment. I wonder how it would go. I do have conversations about creating versus consuming. And that’s a conversation that I have quite a bit. And they of course, know what I do and how I use social media. And so they certainly see that aspect of it. It’s not something where they’re like, Okay, yeah, you’re right, let’s go build something rather than play a video game. But I guess I hope that they start thinking that way. And though they don’t have a passion to start a channel or create something. Likeat least I don’t see them doing that other than just little fun things with their friends, I think that you ingrain that value, you ingrain that thinking in their mind and in their brain. And then when the time comes, when they have the idea, or when they feel a little more confident about their abilities to do something, then it’s a natural step for them so that’s a good question. Because yeah, I mean, I certainly don’t force them to do anything in those ways. Although some people do. I shouldn’t say certainly don’t force them, because some people probably do it to some success. I’ve never done that. We’ve never done that that way. But I yeah, hope the values and hope the things that we’ve taught and modeled when they’re ready to apply them to their lives, they will

Clint Murphy 1:01:45
And how old are they now?

Joshua Becker 1:01:46
My son’s a sophomore in college, and my daughter is a junior in high school.

Clint Murphy 1:01:50
Yeah. It’s interesting, because you say something enough. And then you role model it, and may not think it, but it gets picked up talking to my son the other day, he said it, same thing. No. Oh, sorry. Yeah, I was just on the drive home. What do you want to do when you grow up? And I can’t tell if he was joking or not. But he said, maybe I’ll do what you do that, maybe I’ll be an influencer in certain ways. And so it’s, you know, the seeds get planted,

Joshua Becker 1:02:15
It becomes any value that you teach and model for your kids becomes something that they can always come back to. That’s the way I look at it, like, my son will leave college and will he choose to live a minimalist lifestyle? I don’t know, I always say, it doesn’t matter until he gets his first paycheck at a real job. Like, that’s when it’s gonna matter when he has the money to buy a bunch of things. Like that’s when it’s gonna matter. And but he could choose to go buy the as much stuff as he wanted and could go like the exact opposite of the way I’ve chosen to live my life. But five years down the road, 10 years down the road where he realizes that’s not the answer, he can always go back to oh, now it makes sense as to why my dad lived this way. Now, it makes sense as to why my parents always talked about that. I think faith is always a big aspect of that, like, they may not choose your faith when they leave the home. But at any point in their lives, they can always go back to oh, now that makes sense to me. And now I understand why that was so important to my parents.

Clint Murphy 1:03:20
The last question on the book, because I thought it was beautiful was one of your more popular slogans that you use. “You don’t have to live like everyone else. In fact, you’ll probably be happier if you don’t.” What does that one mean to you to Joshua? And why is it one of your more popular ones?

Joshua Becker 1:03:36
To me, it means, and not that I have this stuff all figured out but like I think most people are living a life chasing things, buying things they don’t need, wanting things they don’t need, chasing money, chasing fame, and I think a lot of people are chasing, even back to that original quote, chasing heedless luxury and spending time on no good activity. And I think bucking that trend and choosing to live your own life by your own values, focusing on what’s most important to you, I think is rare, more rare in our world than than I would like it to be. And I think that ultimately we get to the end of our lives with fewer regrets when we live true to ourselves. Intentional lives focused on the things that matter most to us, as opposed to everything that culture and the world are telling us we should be focused on.

Clint Murphy 1:04:32
I love it. That’s beautiful. Do you have time for, we have a Final Four section for rapid fire questions to help our audience grow.

Joshua Becker 1:04:39
Okay, sure. I will try to be quick.

Clint Murphy 1:04:41
All right. What is one book you’ve read that’s had a large impact on your life,

Joshua Becker 1:04:47
Man, so many good ones. I love a book. It’s a Christian based book called Money, Possessions and Eternity by Randy Alcorn. It’s always had a significant impact on my life.

Clint Murphy 1:04:57
I love that and if we look at your bookshelf, Right now, what’s the top read that you’ve got on the go?

Joshua Becker 1:05:02
Top read that I have on the go meaning what book I’m reading right now.

Clint Murphy 1:05:06
You bet. Yeah,

Joshua Becker 1:05:07
I just finished last week, I finished a fiction book called The Terminal List. I think Jack Carr was the name of that the name of the writer, which they turned into Amazon Prime series. Yeah, I read the book.

Clint Murphy 1:05:20
Yeah, that’s right. Yeah. Great. Great.

Joshua Becker 1:05:23
Don’t always read it, I have a good mix between fiction and nonfiction. So I just finished that fiction book.

Clint Murphy 1:05:27
Oh, I could see that being a thriller based on the way they turned it into a miniseries. Yeah. And so this might be a question where you’re one of the first guests to say, well, I haven’t bought anything, because the next question is the typical, what’s one thing, you know, in the last year or so that you’ve bought under $1,000, that you realize, hey, this actually was valuable to my life.

Joshua Becker 1:05:47
It’s very funny because I spoke at a conference in North Carolina last week. And as a part of it, they made a video and asked me what’s the last thing you bought? And it was funny, because I just restrung my tennis racket. My wife’s been taking tennis lessons for years, so that we could play and so I just had my racket restrung, maybe a week and a half ago, and we’ve been playing on Sunday evenings ever since then. So I’ll answer the same way to answer that question. I got my tennis racket really strong. And I’ve been playing with my wife. And it’s been enjoyable.

Clint Murphy 1:06:19
And I know a lot, I’m starting to know more and more people that are doing that a bit later in life saying, hey, tennis is the one sport that we can play as a couple and so my wife and me are taking tennis lessons to just have some, so yeah, that’s it’s interesting that’s your answer. I like it. And so because the show is about growth, I always love to end with is there a habit, a mindset, or a belief that you’ve changed in the last year that’s had a positive impact on your life that you would share with the audience?

Joshua Becker 1:06:55
In the last year? Habit? Or even in the last couple? Yeah, every time I write a book, I gained 25 pounds. So I’m not sure how healthy it is for me, I don’t know why it happens. Maybe I shouldn’t wait for the last minutes to meet my deadlines. But so well, this would have been a year and a half or so that’s my answer. I am on a streak of about 18 months of working out five times a week, whether it be weight training, or running. And so I’ll say that when I’ve worked out in the past, but never this consistently for so long. And I do love it, it really does seem to align your Gary Thomas says our bodies are the instruments through which we make a difference in the world. And so I always think taking care, being physically active and taking care of your body, whether it be eating well, and resting well. And getting exercise really lays the foundation for the rest that you’re going to do in life.

Clint Murphy 1:07:47
Yeah. When you’re physically in shape, it helps you be so much more mentally in shape. That’s a wonderful answer. And so if we, in our wide ranging conversation, is there anything that we missed out that you want to make sure you get across to the listeners in a final message?

Joshua Becker 1:08:03
No, I think we covered a lot. You do a good job. So I hope this is beneficial to the listener for sure. Raised a lot. We’ve covered a lot of ground.

Clint Murphy 1:08:10
Yeah, it was fun. The. Where can our listeners find you I want to make sure they’re able to get you on all your socials.

Joshua Becker 1:08:16
Yeah, good question. My home base is becomingminimalist.com. That’s always been my home base online. And I do a lot of different things, books and the YouTube channel and social media and have a couple of magazines that digital magazines that I run, but everything runs through becomingminimalist.com. So send people there, thanks.

Clint Murphy 1:08:35
Perfect. Yeah, we’ll get them there. And then we’ll also get all your socials in there. So they know all the various spots to find you. And thank you for joining me on the podcast today. It was wonderful to talk to you, Joshua.

Joshua Becker 1:08:46
Nice to meet you, Clint. And thanks for having me on.

Clint Murphy 1:08:49
Thank you for joining us on the pursuit of learning, make sure to hit the subscribe button and head over to our website, the pursuit of learning.com where you will find our show notes, transcripts and more. If you like what you see, sign up for our mailing list. Until next time, your host in learning Clint Murphy