Overcome - A Mental Health Podcast

Money, Mindset, and Mental Health: Paris Cluff’s Journey to Financial Freedom

• Travis White | Mental Health Advocate • Episode 45

Share episode

In this powerful episode of Overcome: A Mental Health Podcast, host Travis White sits down with Paris Cluff, a husband, father, and financial coach, to explore how money, mindset, and mental health intertwine. Paris shares his incredible journey from financial devastation during the 2008 crash to achieving true financial freedom — both emotionally and practically.

Through raw honesty and hard-won wisdom, Paris opens up about losing everything, rebuilding from scratch, and learning how faith, gratitude, and intentional money habits can transform your mental health. Together, Travis and Paris discuss how our relationship with money often mirrors our relationship with ourselves — and how shifting your mindset can be the first step toward healing, hope, and prosperity.

If you’ve ever struggled with financial stress, anxiety, or self-worth, this episode will remind you that money, mindset, and mental health are connected — and that you can overcome even the hardest financial setbacks with the right perspective and plan.

What We Discussed

  • Paris Cluff’s rise, fall, and recovery from financial collapse
  • The powerful connection between money, mindset, and mental health
  • How faith, gratitude, and resilience helped Paris rebuild
  • Daily habits that restore confidence and self-trust
  • Moving from survival mode to abundance mindset
  • Financial planning tips that protect your peace
  • How to rebuild after trauma — emotionally and financially

Learn More

Free Resource: Download Paris’s free ebook and learn how to find hidden money in your budget at ParisCluff.com/freebook

Connect with Paris Cluff:

Shop Merch:

https://overcomepod.com/shop

Follow Overcome - a Mental Health Podcast

Listen to us

Want to have a real conversation about your mental health? Fill out this form!

Hello and welcome to Overcome, a mental health podcast. I'm your host, Travis White. This is a place for you to share your mental health stories. I'm very excited about tonight's guest. I'm speaking with Paris Clough. Paris is a husband, father, and financial coach. Welcome to the show, Paris. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. I think we're going to have a great conversation. same here and without wasting any time I'm just gonna have hand the microphone right over to you and let you tell you your tell us about your journey Sure, you bet. I actually got started as a financial coach in 2001. I was working for a corporation at the time and the HR department came up and said, hey, Paris, you qualify for the 401k. And I was like, what in the heck is that? know, some new code that I got. I did something wrong or right. Anyways, all I knew about money at that point in my life was it was green and I wanted more. And I decided that I was going to really invest in my future and my retirement. I needed to know what I was doing. It was an important thing for me. Like it was like, who am going to marry? What house am I going to buy? How many kids am I? Like, what is your retirement? Like those are all important decisions for life. And I thought I didn't, I didn't want to leave it to chance. I asked a couple of my coworkers what they did and they were like, well, we threw darts, flipped coins, put it on the company stock. I'm like, that's not what I want to do. And so I started really learning a lot about em money. started reading books and just becoming self-taught. one of my coworkers turned to me one day and she said, Paris, you have, can you help me? I don't know what to do. And she was a little older. And so I thought, well, that's strange. I thought you knew already, like you, I thought you would know. And she, she basically said, no, I need help. And I shared with her what I was learning. And what, after I had, had the confidence to finally make my own choices in my own 401k, I shared with her what I did and what I'd learned. And she turns to me, she says, Paris, you have a gift. You should do this for a living. Like you. have a way of explaining things and making it super easy and simple to understand. And I was like, thank you. And so I kind of was pursuing it as a career. went to the local university and I had my degree, my associate's degree, and I was going to go get my bachelor. Anyways, in the process of doing that, I met another guy who was a recruiter for financial services, a financial advisory firm. And he's like, Paris, you can go to school and you can learn and then earn, or you can work with us and earn while you learn. And I was like, well. have a young family and I want to earn, I'd rather earn while I learn. And so what was interesting is that today we call them side hustles. And back in those days, I don't know what we call them, but it was, I was basically one of the pioneers of side hustle. Cause I worked full time and I had my side hustle in financial advising and financial services. And then I went full time and did it. And I was building a really successful business. And as a man, as a husband, as a father, I'm going to kind of just open up a little bit. We like to... We associate our self-worth a lot of times with our net worth. And we associate our ability to provide, because that's what we're supposed to do as men, right? We're supposed to provide. And well, not just men, but mothers too, right? Moms are to do that. Whoever's listening, if you're a father or a mother, you know, your job is to provide and to protect and to preside over that organization, your family. And so I was cruising along. I was making a bunch of money. I was building an agency. I was... you know, bringing on other agents and training them. And I was building an agency where I could actually make money on the agents I was training. So I was, I was headed towards six figures and then anybody who's old enough to remember 2008, 2008 hit like a freight train for me. Anyways, I was in, I had a lot of clients that were real estate investors. They would buy a property and flip it and take a bunch of money and they put it in with, I didn't, I'd manage it for them. And then they would. you know, take the money and go buy the next one. And in 2008, the economy made such a huge shift that a lot of my clients couldn't sustain their properties and maintain their investments with me. And as a financial advisor, we get paid for how much assets we have under management and for the different mutual funds and that we've sold. And when those are drained or taken or closed out, when those accounts are closed out, our income stops. I went from knocking on, and I was commission only. I'm 100%. I didn't work for W2. so entrepreneurs have a, there's a, entrepreneurs have a little weird thing in their head anyways, right? We do, for those who are listening who are entrepreneurs know we were a little weird anyways. And so I was in 2008 when that downturn hit, I... I just remember one day my income went from knocking on the door of a hundred grand to the next year I think I made just under 20 grand, which is not good for a husband and father. I had three or four kids at the time. Anyways, yeah, I had four kids at the time. I have five total now, but I had four at the time. And I just remember sitting on the couch in the living room. I had literally drained all my savings and my credit card companies and my lenders, my house, my cars, they were all calling me every day, like 10 times a day. I don't know if you've ever been in that situation. And what's funny is that a couple years prior to this, I had read a book, which is really good. It's called The Ultimate Gift. And in that book, the guy who's the main, one of the main characters, and I won't ruin the book for you, but it's a really good book. One the main characters says, you've never really lived until you've lost everything. And I was like, okay, I didn't really appreciate that at the time because I'd always been blessed and I always had what I needed. always had resources. I had a wonderful family. My wife was a stay at home mom and we were just doing great. And then I lost everything and I had to check myself and I had to see if I was willing. I learned that that's true. really do live. Like life is real when you're on food stamps. Life is real when you're in the fetal position saying what happened to me? How did I get here? How do I get out of this? And I just remember sitting on the couch and I had just gotten off the phone with one of the most ruthless credit collection company guys. And he was just like, we're gonna take you down. We're gonna. you know, bankrupt you, we're gonna do all this stuff. And I just remember sitting back on my couch just like, God, what do I do? Like I've never been here before. And it hit me like a, I literally for a minute, I think I, it just, the weight of the pressure just hit me so hard I lost my breath for a second. And then all of sudden I had this really strong feeling of you're gonna be okay, just get to work. And it took three or four years. to finally come back from that. But it was one of the toughest. I would never, I don't wish it on anybody, but I would say that it was the most, it was the most profound experience of my life and has built, was a pivotal moment. It was one of those, I call them defining moments in life. defining moments for me is when I get married, when I buy my first house, when you have your first kid, even every kid, right? It's a defining moment, but. when I lost everything and I had to reevaluate my worth as a man, as a father, as a husband, as a business person, as an entrepreneur, like was I going back to W2 or was I, you know, did I lose everything to, you know, go back to, you know, that, um, working for somebody else or was I going to be able to, you know, save this and salvage this and move forward? And, um, so that's kind of, today, thankfully, I have a six figure passive income, uh, mostly passive. And I have a significant six figure net worth. I'm not a millionaire, but I'm definitely living with a lot of tools and strategies today that I didn't have back then that have, there are kind of contingencies and I have plans and backup plans. And one of the things that I learned going through that was that you can have a goal, but if you don't have a plan, you're not going to achieve it as readily. And the plan really helps me. Like if I know If this happens, what do I do? Well, I have a plan for it and that helps me with my mental health. And so that's kind of the things that I've learned over those years. I've really learned how to help people manage, protect and grow their money from the things I've learned by mismanaging, misprotecting and not growing my own. So I, when I teach people as a coach, one of the things I teach them is, Hey, this is how I do it. This is, I'm coming to you from moral authority here cause I've lived it and I was, I remember I don't know if you have any questions Travis, but I'll just keep going. I just remember one day sitting in the grocery store, I was in the line. And again, I was making almost six figures at my job before I quit. So to have entrepreneurial business that kind of gets you back to that and then lose it all, it's like, wow. I remember sitting at the grocery store, as the lady was or the cashier, I'm saying lady, but it might've been a man that was ringing everything up. And I was like, shoot, I can't afford that. I got to put it back. Cause my EBT card would only allow me to buy so much money, so much per month. And so I was just like, dang it. I can't put that, put that back. And I was like, can you put that back and put this back? And I got to the point where it's just, you know, it's embarrassing, frankly, to have that experience, but it was where I was at and it was what I was able to do. the when we turned in our EBT cards when we actually called them up as soon as we could and we said, hey, we're we don't need them anymore. It was like, what? Like nobody ever calls us and tells us they don't need these things anymore. So it was kind of fun once we finally got through that whole process. So it was it was quite the experience coming out of it. And I just remember sitting, you know, praying and I'm a man of faith. I try to be anyways. And I was just praying to God like, help me, help me understand. Help me have the mental fortitude and the toughness to get through this and get out of this. And I just remember literally sitting in the fetal position more often than not. thankfully I've healed so much from that experience that I can talk about it openly and really kind of help anybody who has a similar experience. But that was the most significant trauma and depression time of my life. I've had others like I think we shared right before the show. This last year was a real tough one with my wife and her health. And what was amazing to me is that just to kind of reiterate, her health was so bad. She took, I mean, she had days where it was the whole day she was a panic attack, like the whole day she was going through it. watching your sweetheart go through that is not easy at all. And so I have a little PTSD, frankly, from some of that myself, but... What was cool about financially speaking on that is we were able to afford to take, to make sure that she got the care that she needed and we were able to pay for it and get it taken care of because we were so much smarter with the way we dealt with our money this time. And that gave me some, as anxiety and provoking and panicking as it is to watch your sweetheart go through something horrible, it was nice to know that at least I could afford it. at least I could take care of it financially. And even if it cost us more money than we could afford, we have resources to pull from to be able to take care of it. And that kind of helps me with my, like I'm a little, I love spreadsheets and I love analyticals and all this stuff, you know what mean? So my money is all in these places and I have fun things that I do with my money to make sure that I have money for things that come up. And we can talk a little bit more about that if you want, but. That was kind of a big thing this last year even that I had to go through on some issues that I'm dealing with with my own mental health right now even. it's like it to me, mental health is something that's lifelong, it's ongoing. you might have a, so what was it 15 years ago, I had a significant defining moment and did okay for five or 10 years and got back out of it. Well, it took me three or four years to get out of it. And then it was, Um, you know, by 2017, I was pretty cool. And then just up till about last year or two years, um, now I'm back working through some things that I've had to deal with in the last couple of years. So it's, I feel like, and maybe I'm only 50. So, uh, you know, when I'm 60, maybe I'll have another one. Who knows? Right. But I feel like every time I have one, I learn a little bit different from it. And just to kind of give you an idea, I'll, I'll, um, I'll turn it back to you after this comment. I remember, so 2008, 2009, really 2010, it just kind of ripple affected and domino affected the whole, but I remember going to a conference for my company and some of my friends that I, they're all over the country, they all come together in Vegas, all of the people in the business that I was involved with, all the financial advisors would come to this convention every year from all over the country. And I remember asking about a couple of people that I saw the previous year. and said, hey, how are they doing? And they're like, they didn't make it. They took their lives because they were so panicked and so much anxiety, so much depression from having their clients and their own money just losing everything. And I was like, wow, that was real. Like that was a real event for a lot of people. it happens again in 2020, but I survived it because I was so much more prepared. Like that's something that I learned coming out of that 15 years ago is. I need to be better prepared for whatever life can throw at me. And that's given me a lot. I had a lot of anxiety going through the whole 2020, 2021, 2022 as well. And I feel good now because we made it, you know, we made it and we were okay. But that's kind of my story, Travis, for in a nutshell. really cool to hear a story where you were able just to push through it and overcome the hard times. I was laid off three times in seven years. So I can relate a little bit to, I wasn't to the point where, like, you know, I saw a little bit of savings, not a ton, but it was basically living off of unemployment. But It seems like each time that I got a new job, that new job was just a little bit better, more money, and just a step above the last. So like, even though it was harder each time, because it's like, nobody likes to get laid off. it's like the last time I was laid off, had two kids, now I have three. And it's like, well, I have more mouths to feed. Like, what am I going to do? So it's like finding those tactics to, you know, keep going. like you said, putting your trust in God. But when it comes to like the dark times, what role does mindset play in your life to help you overcome that depression or that anxiety? I think to me mindset changes everything. It really does. I, so as an entrepreneur, when I first started my entrepreneurial journey, I had the opportunity to have some mentors that were like, look, entrepreneurialism is not for the faint of heart. You kind of have to have some mental toughness to be an entrepreneur. So go read these self-help books. And I know that, you know, self-help books to some people listening might sound boring as heck, but I'll tell you. those self-help books, I was in the deep dark pit and abyss, if you will, those affirmations, those techniques, those strategies, I feel like my belief is that, you know, so if you don't mind, I'll quote a scripture real fast. In John, apostles were a little bit nervous and. because Jesus was about to leave and he's like, they're like, what do do when you leave? And he's like, don't worry, I will send the comforter and the comforter will remind you of the things and he will bring all things to your remembrance. And I was like, in those moments, I feel like the comforter came to me and brought those things to my remembrance and reminded me, hey, Paris, you have strategies, you have mental toughness techniques, you have strategies and techniques that you can get through this. You're more resilient than you think. know, when you're in those places, the voices are loud, dude, like I'm telling you, like the and I call I call the voices that are telling me I'm a loser and all those things. I call them the devil and his kingdom. Right. So when they're screaming at me, I'm like, dude, go back to hell where you belong. Right. And then there's a really good um praise song. I can't remember who sings it, but it's called Fear is a Liar. And I that's something that I've really taken to heart recently anyways, but back in the 2008 era, it was just being reminded of all the things that I had done to really build my mental toughness before that. And some people don't ever have the strength to build or they didn't build it big enough and they get hit hard and they end up crumbling. that's, there's, in my opinion, There's some, we need to give grace to men and women who have those experiences, like, because those are not fun. It's not easy. feel, I counted a miracle that I came through with more mental toughness on the other side. I counted a miracle for sure, because I could have definitely gone all kinds of ways with the darkness that was screaming in my ears. Yeah, yeah, it's crazy in it. The hard part is about all this though is it's sad that it takes such a big life challenge to get to that mental state sometimes. To actually, you know, have that clarity in mind like, you know, I can overcome this. I just have to keep pushing. But I like the story you told us, like, because it's like, I'm gonna bring religion into it again. It's like... During my hard times, every time I was reminded of Christ, like that's the times, that's when I got through that. That's when I was actually able to push through. Because my problem is two times is I, when I've gone through a hard time, I kind of push away and start going the other direction from faith. So it's always hard for me to hold on. So. I love the verse that you quoted from John there. Well, it just reminds me of the fact that the enemy wants to keep us down depressed. know, Galatians talks about the fruit of the spirit being joy and peace and happiness. And I'm like, well, the opposite of those things are the fruits of the other dude. Right. So if you're depressed and anxious and panicking and all those other things, you're experiencing the fruits of the other dude. and that's, you know, it's real to me. It's real. I've had real experiences and I'm just like. Leave me alone. Go back to hell where you belong and go back. And I just want to follow my light. Follow the light. and build the light back into my life again. As soon as I start doing that, and it's not easy, I'm telling you, it's hard. When you're in those places where you're feeling sad, depressed, down, like anything, that's when those temptations come for all kinds of things, whether it's drugs, alcohol, whether it's spending. In my business, as a financial coach, I get to talk with people about spending addictions. That's sometimes shopping, it's the way that they cope. And, um, you know, I've actually worked with addiction recovery. My, my, my, brother-in-law is, I think he's got his four or five year coin from AA and, I've gone to several meetings with him and, just helped, you know, I love that whole thing because I think we can all benefit from it, whether I've never been, or I, I personally never had a traditional addiction, but I feel like the strategies and the steps. help you even for like depression and anxiety and panic. Those steps are still there. If they can help somebody who's a raging alcoholic or an eight raging drug addict get to a point of peace and happiness, like why wouldn't they work for somebody who just has depression and I mean not just depression, you know what I mean? Like but who has depression anxiety and not has substance abuse too. Like to me that was like okay this makes sense. I'm gonna learn this too because and that helped me a lot. those 12 steps and those kinds of things helped me a lot too to get through some of the stuff that I have been dealing with in my life. really cool. And what do you where like, think of like the time you're your darkest point. Was there a breaking point or anything that comes to mind that pushed you to start healing? You know, one of the things that I feel like the devil or the enemy or the voices, the bipolar, whatever you want to call it, they like to just keep you focused on the problem. And these are the problems. These are the problems. These are the problems. These are the problems. And I just I do remember I don't remember anything specific. right now off the top of my head that's a great question but I don't have a specific moment but I do know that when I'm in the spiral of all the problems that I've got in my life I have another reminder there are solutions to every problem and you can find them if you'll just turn to them And one of the things that helps me kind of get out of it faster than ever, like I've actually just started doing this again because I've had a few days where I've had those, you know, those Mondays, right? Where you're like, no, it's Monday again. I got to get going. And so I start to say to myself, it sounds goofy and maybe a little woo woo, but I've really spent some time saying, you know what, I'm grateful that I'm alive. I'm grateful for things. Today's going to be a great day. I have a uh wife that loves me and kids that love me. And I have a house that's got heating and air conditioning. Like I start to say the things out loud that I'm grateful for. And then all of the problems in my life kind of start to shrink and all of the blessings in my life start to increase. And so those are those that's kind of a technique or strategy that I use when I'm spiraling down into the darkness of problems and just overwhelming and you're not good enough and you're never going to make it and nothing's ever going to work. just start saying, well, you know what? It has worked before. I've done things that obviously I. I'm 50 years old and I'm still alive. I have money in the bank. I have a good, thriving business. I'm talking to great people like Travis White and whoever's listening. And, you know, here we are. And I'm like, you know what? I have things to be grateful for. Um, and so I just start focusing on those things and those helped me pull up. That's like the, you know, the Mayday, Mayday SOS, you your, your nose diving into the earth. You're like, pull up, pull up. So those, those are the things that helped me kind of pull up and get going. And that's, know, when I sit down with, myself and, a client and we talk about the different things that are in their life. I mean, there's so many reasons for us to be depressed and have anxiety and panic. There's a ton of reasons. I know that one of the main reasons is money and the ability to manage it correctly. Sometimes it's earning it. And then once you make it, like, what do I do after that? Like, how do I, how do I manage it? So that it, you know, they say it's not about making how much you make it's how much you keep. And so we do need to make more money, but we also need to manage what we make more efficient, efficiently and effectively because how many of us argue with our spouse or argue with our kids or argue with ourselves about the money and the situation, how much things cost and inflation and marriages, you know, are spiraling, you know, out of control because they're arguing and you don't want to, you know, you're arguing about money more often than not. And when you're arguing about money, where does the love go out the window, you know? And so that's one of the things as a financial coach, I get to touch on a lot of different aspects of people's life because money touches so many areas. And so that's one of the things that I that I think that I've built a foundation with my own money that gives me some of those. I mean, still have stress. I still have anxiety about money. I still worry about like, I just got a bill in the mail and I'm like, all right, well. This wasn't expected. I don't like it, but at least I had the money for it, right? So, but I still had that bubbling up of anxiety, like, my gosh, what are we gonna do? How am I gonna get this taken care of? And I was able to do it, because I have a plan in place, and I'd worked the plan, and I'd built the plan, and I know it'll be okay. And that helps me diminish what could be a way greater stressor. If that makes sense. Yeah, that totally makes sense. And I really enjoyed you talking about showing gratitude and how you do that and those affirmations because I think that's a big step in pretty much rebuilding trust in yourself after things are starting to fall apart. Mm-hmm. I really like what you just said, Travis, building trust in yourself. So just as a quick side note, one thing that I knew in 2008 as I was rebuilding back out of it. Um, I was, I like exercising, so I'm kind of a different guy. I, that's what I chose. I would say choose something that you know, will, will give you, bring you joy and it will, it will not, give you any stress. I knew that if I went to the gym, a 25 pound weight couldn't lie to me and tell me it was 30 or 12 or it was 12. The iron never lied. Right. And I, that was one of the things that I was worried about in business. Cause people would tell me things and they'd do another thing. And so I was just like, who can I trust? And then I would like, can I even trust myself? Right. And so one of the biggest ways to build confidence and to build trust in yourself is to keep the commitments that you've made to yourself and start with small ones. Like get up, get out of bed, turn, don't snooze. You know what mean? Like sometimes it's just as simple as. get dressed, take a shower. I did it, you know what mean? Starting small and I, every day I went to the gym until today, don't, I feel like a fish out of water if I miss a day lifting weights and I don't necessarily want to be a bodybuilder, you know, somebody, know, whoever the big Simon Sinek, not Simon Sinek, there's this new kid in town that's like the big guy on social media who's a bodybuilder. I don't want to do that. I just want to maintain my physique. I want to be able to just stay conditioned and stay, and it keeps my mind focused. for those few minutes I know I can at least keep that commitment and that starts my day off really well and so it helps me build trust again in myself. That's huge Travis, what you just said is huge. Yeah, and it's all about habits, like building up those good habits and continuing to do them. And when it comes to like, let me rephrase that. How do money and mindset intersect in your work with others? Well, as I shared a little bit, there's so much of our worth that we put on money because money really runs so much like. How much, what kind of house can we buy? What kind of food can we eat? What kind of schools do we get to send our kids to? What kind of entertainment can we enjoy? It all boils down to what we have as resources to be able to spend or use those resources with. So, I mean, a lot of times when I talk to people, it's like, let's get the found, I think we're more consumers than we are creators and we need to be more creative than consumption. So when you can build savings accounts, like I personally believe that one of the key problems in life in stressors is that we're spending tomorrow's money today. And when you spend tomorrow's money today, it keeps you on the treadmill, keeps you in the rat race. It keeps you constantly with that carrot out in front, right? So to speak. My goal with my clients is to teach them how to spend yesterday's money today. you already made it. So when I'm talking to somebody about their spending habits, One of the big things is, okay, if you go to the store, like all of us who have kids, and I don't know how old your kids are, Travis, but if they're old enough to go to the store with you and see all the cool stuff on the shelf, you've had this experience. Dad, can we buy this? Right? I wanna buy this. And so one of the things I learned how to do, and this was before Amazon's wish list came around, but I would tell my kids, put it on a list. create a list, write it down. And I would write it down, I'd carry a list sometimes if they didn't have it, I'd write it down, I'd show them, look, let's write this down. So they got a feeling, okay, dad knows that this is important to me, but even if we don't buy it right now. So I said, let's put it on the list and let's save up for it. It's so much dollars and we'll save up for it. And then when we have the money, we'll come back and we'll buy it. So a lot of times we'll save up for it, we'll come back and they're like, I don't even want it anymore. Okay, well, that's great. So you know it was an impulse buy. And so to me, if we can switch, from buying from savings to buying from credit, I think that we're gonna reduce a lot of our stresses. And if you can do that, and I think that's a lot of the mindset of I'm gonna save up for things. And it really comes from a position of gratitude. Like I have money, I can do it versus entitlement. To me, And this is a broad stroke here. So somebody listening might say, well, let's get into the details of this. And that's fine. We can. But it's an entitlement mentality to me to say, I'm going to buy something with tomorrow's money because I have a great job. It's going to continue to be a great job. You've already said, Travis, you've got laid off three times. Like, what's the reality in life? We're going to probably get laid off. We're probably going to have setbacks. Like my business, I don't have a business. I'm not employed so nobody can lay me off, but I have clients that cancel or go to somewhere else and I got to make up the difference. There's pros and cons to employee and entrepreneur and entrepreneur. There's pros and cons. So I feel like if somebody manages their money effectively and they really work to build wealth, they're going to be able to have more peace, more tranquility, more serenity than the person. For example, my car, I walked out Friday morning and my car wouldn't start. And that's a stressor for anybody. Like, first of all, am I going to be late to my appointment? You know, am going to make it to my errands? Am I going to get to work? Like just a whole bunch of stuff going through. Am I going to be able to afford it? Hopefully it's just a battery. You know, it's not just, you know, what could go wrong? Like, like all the stress around mechanical stuff. There's people out there that are mechanics that are like, no big deal. But to me, I'm not a mechanic, so it was a big deal for me. so I was like, you know what? The good news is I have money in a savings account for car mishaps. So when I finally got it into the mechanics, like, it's just the battery. only this much money. I was like, thank goodness. I have way more than that saved for it. And so I was able to just pay for it. And so it's nice. Life is going to be stressful. add to that by mismanaging your money and being in debt. And now you are in now that you're in debt and you're because you've just consumed way more than you should have because you felt like you were entitled to it because I work hard I deserve this you know yes yeah you work hard and you might deserve some things but do yourself a favor and don't put yourself in a position where you're gonna you know regret it later. I can say I'm probably guilty of a few things that you just mentioned. I was like, I could probably fix a few things off of what Paris is saying here. That's so true. It's real for all of us. So what would you say that most people get wrong about rebuilding after a financial and emotional crisis? I think the biggest thing is to change. So there's a saying that I really like. If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got. And so if you like what you're getting, keep doing what you're doing. But if you don't like what you're getting, then change what you're doing. And another thing that I like to say is that money has more to do with habits, behaviors, and beliefs than it does with math. And so as someone rebuilds, they need to look at the habits that got like, I have a client right now that they came to me and they said, Paris, we can get out of debt, but then we get right back into it. And then we get out of it again. And then we get right back into it. Like this cycle, like we want to be able to get out once and for all. And to me, that's kind of the same, that's a rebuilder's mindset. Like, we're finally ready to get out of this situation and never go back. And whether it's a really deep dark situation or whether it's just kind of like a just kind of one of those stressors that kind of is more of an annoyance. I feel like check your habits. What are your habits? What are your behaviors? What are the beliefs that you have around money? Like, do you believe that money is hard? Do believe the people who make money are crooks and swindling others? Do you believe that or do you believe that money is easy that you can make it quickly and easy if you just get the right side hustle or you just try to find the right niche, you're going to be able to go for it you're going be able to have that passive whatever income you want. Like what are your beliefs? What are your, and then are you living, you, are your habits can congruent with that? And if you, if you look back and you say, this, that this belief, this habit and this behavior got me into the hole I was in. I'm not going to do those habits, behaviors, and beliefs anymore. I want to find new ones. And sometimes you need a coach. to get you out of those, to help you through it. And accountability coach or accountability partner. You can do a, there's all kinds of different coaching. You can do biblio coaching. You can do coaching with a person like me who's gone through it and can I help you through it? can go person with a life coach, whatever you want to do. Oh, YouTube videos. Some of them are really good actually. But I would say start with habits and um atomic habits is a great book. You know, the Think and Grow Rich is another great book about belief. Frankly, the Bible, the scriptures are great books as well, but work on your belief system and work on that gratitude and that you're worthy, you're worth it, you can do it. You don't have to be a jerk to be a millionaire. You can actually be a millionaire and be a really good person. There's another really fun thing I like to say is that money doesn't make you, it reveals you and then it magnifies you. So if you're a good person and you wanna magnify good in the world, get moneyed up so you can actually produce a lot of good in the world. I'm tired of these guys out there doing all kinds of derelict immoral things making a ton of money. tired of that. I want good people to make bunches of money so we can do good in the world. That make sense? That's what I'm about. that totally makes sense. I knew somebody who lived close to my mother-in-law and my wife was like, they're like multi-millionaires and you wouldn't even know it. Because they were so humble. And it's like, yeah, it was crazy, yeah. That's legit. And it's like, it's like, I feel like we need more of those type of people. Yeah. Me too, me too. Let's bring them out. Let's raise up a generation of people that are wealthy. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, I'm all about it. I want to get a little bit more wealth under my belt first so I can preach it a little bit more. So to some client, if they're still living in survival mode, how do you approach a person like that? So one thing that I actually just recently found myself because of the all of the health concerns that happened to my wife over the last year, I found myself really focusing in on all of the problems, the overwhelm, feeling like there's no way out. around every corner, around every corner is going to be another crisis. Every phone call is going to be a kid telling me they got this out of the other. My wife telling me something, you know, she's back. I need to take her to the ER. I mean, it was just like, it just felt like I was in survival mode for a while, just even the last, you know, last in 2024. 2025 has been a much better year. And so one of the things that my wife and I just decided to do recently was to dream a little bit. we, we don't, we're not able to, we can pull the trigger on several things, but we're not able to pull the trigger on everything that we want to do. But the fact that we started to dream a little bit more again, and what I mean by that is, let's say right now you're listening to this and you're just in survival mode. Like there's no way out. You're all the voices are telling you, you're never going to make it. There's no way out. Everybody else is going to be rich. Like I've literally genuinely, I get frustrated when I see, I'm 50 and I genuinely get frustrated when I see these 25 year old, 30 year old kids on TikTok and Instagram and everyone else say stuff, stay stuff. Like I'm a millionaire already at 29 years old. I'm like, man, life is going to kick you in the, you know what, if you're not careful. And, and quite frankly, a lot of those people lose their money cause they're not wise with it. Cause they're spending it like knuckleheads. And so I just decided, you know, my wife and I sat down and like, we gotta get out of this cycle. We gotta get out of this cycle of this we're in and how can we do that? So she's like, let's start. So we started talking about dreaming again. We went outside in our backyard and we're like, what can we do here? Can we remodel this or can we look at it? Again, we're not able to pull the trigger on it, but we just started dreaming again. What's possible? So I would say if you're in it right now and I know you're gonna feel like it's a lie, you're faking, it's fake. but sit down and start saying all the good things that your life has brought to you. Tell yourself some of those positive affirmations and then set aside some time to set a goal. Like let's say that you're living in an apartment and you're barely able to pay rent next month and like it's, as of this recording, it's the 31st of July. So you might be sitting here, know, the reality, August 1st is tomorrow and you might be, I don't know how I'm gonna pay the rent. Sit down for a minute and set some goals like and do this like you're in the present tense. I earn enough money to pay my rent every month and I earn more than enough. Start saying things like that. It's again, it sounds a little woo woo, but I promise you it works. If you write out and you got to write it out, you got to say it, you got to write it out and you got to talk about it as if you already did it. Write down, I will be financially free. will be more, I will be wiser with my money. I, or no, no, I am wise with my money. When I make a dollar, I keep it and I'm wise with it. Like start telling yourself in the present tense, and I promise things will start to shift. It may take a month, it may take two, it may take six, it may take a year, but you'll start to see that, wait a minute, I have. Like maybe you have a goal to buy a car, maybe you have a goal to buy a house, maybe you have a goal to get married, maybe you have a goal to get out of debt, maybe you have a goal to finally start your 401k or start investing and start building a nice nest egg. Whatever it is, I have a nice nest egg. I have a 401k. I know what I'm doing when it comes to investing in the stock market. I'm going to have $100,000 in net worth, you know, I have $100,000 in net worth and then put a date like, a year, two years, three, whatever it is, put a date on it if you can. If you do that, I don't understand all of the things, how things work in this universe, but I know that when you start to do that, things start to move and they start to rearrange. And I believe my personal opinion is that God's like, good, my son or daughter is finally figuring out their worth, because I've been trying to tell them, they're finally figuring out their worth. I'm going to start moving this universe. I'm going to start moving stuff to make sure they get what they're talking about. And so that's something that I would say. I hope that makes sense. That totally makes sense. You're the probably the third person that's come on and talked about like manifesting like that. And I keep putting it off to like write down my goals. now you're making it so like, I really need to stop putting this off because I have so many things in my mind that I want to do. Like so many things that I want to, where I want to take this podcast, you know, like some of my next steps of kind of where I want to go with it. They're all kind of intertwined. But it's like, now I just need to write it down. I have it all played out. I've spoke to my wife about it. It seems like every single time that I start speaking these things, I go through, I get myself in a rut and start thinking, you know, I'm not good enough. Like things don't work out. I'm that type of person. One of my biggest flaws is I'm kind of pessimistic by trait, like, and so I always think the worst of everything, and if I can't see it, sometimes it's hard for me to like, I want it now, like I want it now. So you're explaining to me something that I need to actually sit down and do, especially like, you know, I want to do this within the next year, I want to do this within three years, like, I think it makes complete sense. completely transparent, I do that because if I don't, I will spiral. I'll do the same thing. If I don't spend time to do those things that I just shared, will. That's what I do. The things that I tell people they should do, because I know it works because it works for me. Because if I don't do those things, I just I just sit in that spin mode. And just, I don't get anywhere or do anything. it's like, what can I do today to move the needle forward? Even if it's an inch. What can I do today to move the needle forward on my life, on my goals? What can I implement? What plan can I do? And that's legit, Travis, you're, you and I, when you were explaining yourself, I'm like, yep, that's why I do this. Because if I wasn't, that's where I'd be. Yeah, I've been in this like kind of depressed like anxious mode this last two weeks. Don't know how I got there. Just comes and goes sometimes. Sometimes I do great and other times I'm like, you know what? Life sucks. I'm garbage right now. But my wife and I had a long talk yesterday and she's like, you know what? You need to start. I need to start holding you accountable for the goals that you're making because you have these dreams in life and you're never going to achieve them if you don't push yourself forward. And yeah, yeah. So she's doing it. Yeah, I have a winner. she's not going to go anywhere. She's stuck with me, whether she likes it or not. awesome. And, she's, she's saying, okay, each week you need to write down how you're going to push yourself and the things you're going to do with safe. So I'll give you an example. One of my goals with my podcast is to start like selling merch. Just to make a little bit of side income. And right now my podcast isn't like huge. It's barely in the beginning phase. Mm-hmm. Um, I've put out 30 episodes so far, but, and so she's like, so you need to sit down and you need to write down like the things it's going to take to start selling your shirt. need to buy some samples of that shirt and get some ads up on Google or wherever you want to put them. So that's what I've started doing in the last couple of days. And just to, I've felt a lot better. I mean, that was just yesterday that I actually ordered. So shirts to like, I. designed. So they'll be here in like a week and I'm like okay well I'm moving that needle just a little bit to better myself. That's all it takes, just a little bit every day. And it's a compounding effect. In finance, we call it compound interest. it works with everything that we do. It works with our skills. Just if you hone your skill a little bit every day, in a year, you'll be like, wow, I'm really good at this now. Mm-hmm. thing with just true with a dollar. It's not about the dollar amount that you're investing. It's about the habit of investing. So even if you can only afford 25 cents a month, get in the habit and then it will grow to 50 and a dollar and $10. And before you know it, you'll be like, wow, I got a couple thousand dollars in the savings account or an investment account. You know what mean? So it's just those small things every day. And honestly, do I get overwhelmed with. you know, when I look at Amazon packages continuing to arrive at my door, you know, I'm like, what are we spending, right? Like, where's this going? And so instead of having an argument, I go to my spreadsheets and I look at my net worth. And it's crazy to me that I just did it. I just, do my net worth once a month. A lot of people do it. Well, most people never do it, but I do it once a month. Some people say do it about every quarter or every six months, but I do it once a month. And my net worth increased from, and again, as I shared earlier, this, we're recording this in July, from June to July, my net worth increased. And we had some birthdays and some other expenses come up. I was like, there's, literally, my brain was telling me there's no way that we're going to make it this month. Like we spent way too much. And then I sit down and I look at all, I look at the numbers and I just get clear on the numbers. And then I'm like, my gosh, I was faking myself out. Like the numbers don't lie. I lied to myself as I hear these you're spending too much. You're never gonna make it your savings is drained You're never gonna have it like I was listening to all the voices but then I sat down and did the numbers and did the math and the math was like You actually have more than you thought you did now I'm in a situation where I've gotten to that point where that's my reality I know for a fact there's people out there right now. They're like I have the voices and the math is telling me the same thing. You know what I mean? then if you don't like what you're getting, change what you're doing. And I would be happy to help in that process. So I don't know if this would be a time to m share my free gift to your listeners, Travis and Nabil. So I have a free gift for anybody who's listening and would like to have it. So when I first started in the financial services industry, I was a financial advisor. Like I was licensed, federal licenses, state licenses, I had them all. I still have a state license, but I don't do the federal licenses anymore because as a coach, I have a certificate from the National Financial Educators Council. Anyways, so. 25 years ago when I first started the business and I was calling on people and say, hey, look, I'd like to come over and help you with your finances, help you invest, help you save for your future, help you with all those things. And I would invariably get the objection, I don't have any money. I have no money, I'm in debt, I need to pay my debt first and then I'll talk about investments or I just don't have the budget for it, all kinds of things. And so as an advisor, I'm like, I make money if people invest with me. I don't so I need to figure out a way to get more people to help them find money. And so I created a four It's a four-step process where I can take you through how to find money that you're Misallocating in your budget right now like If you, most people who tell me I don't have any money, just to give you a couple examples, every once in a while I will come across somebody that they've really done some good work and they really don't have very much extra, but it's really rare. I went to a very low income city one time years ago and this couple said we don't have two nickels to put together and I said if I could find three or four hundred dollars. in your budget without rice and beans. I'm not talking about rice and beans. I'm like, if I could find three or $400, would you take half of it and save it and invest it for your future? Because I don't want to, mean, if they're that tight, they need a couple bucks to just kind of have some breathing room. And so they said, sure. And I ended up finding $800 a month for that family. And. The average person, when they go through my process, it's $300 a month that they find that they're able to put back into their budget. And more often than not, if you really go for it and you really do it right, you can find six, seven, $800. One of my colleagues did this, it does a similar process. It wasn't my particular strategy, but it was a similar process. He was able to help a really high income earner find $1,500 a month. Most six figure earners right now are actually feel like they're living paycheck to paycheck. So a lot of times it's not about making more money. It's about the habits you have once you make those money, once you make that money. And so that's my free book. It's an ebook. It's about 18 pages. It's actionable. It's stuff you can actually read and do. So if you go to my website, club.com forward slash free book. you'll be able to download that ebook and you'll be able to go through that process. Now there's an upgrade if you want to learn on base, if you learn better with videos and audio, there's an upgrade there and the ebook is expanded into workbooks that you can actually really do some stuff with. And the upgrade does have a cost to it, but the free book for sure is available to anybody who goes to ParisClough.com forward slash free book and downloads that book. And I promise if you go through it, 30 days later, you're going to have few hundred dollars in your bank account more than you did uh the month before. It's awesome. I love that you're pushing something like, I'm going to help you find money, help you figure out how to dig into your finances and do that. It's just a different approach than I'm used to. Yeah, and when people say Paris, how much do you cost? I'm like, well, I promise that I'm going to help you find more than my cost and in two or three months, you're going to be like, my net worth increased by how much? What the heck? My last client, 10x their net. Just in three or four months, I've been working with him. I've already 10x their investment. In me, their outcome. I know I can help people and that's a huge thing for me as a man, as a provider to just be able to help. thing, which I was just gonna end on this if that's okay. Another really big thing that I do to help me get out of my funky dark depressive states is I'll call a friend and I'll say how can I serve you? Like as soon as I get out of myself and I go serve others there's something deeply profound that happens and changes my whole energy, my whole vibration just changes when I go serve others and when I call friends and say, hey, tell me like, how can I help you? Like, what are you going through? And I kind of want to talk to them or I'll go out and work in the yard or serve them. then, you know, look at my next door neighbor mowing the lawn. I'll go out and help him or something like those are some really good things that I do service serving others is is something that I do to get out of my funky places. Yeah, that's awesome. I love it. I have one general question left for you. em Well, I guess two if you're good for two more questions. So if you could go back and talk to yourself at your lowest moment, what would you say? I would say it's never as bad as it seems. But at the same time on the other side of it, it's never as good as it seems. Just keep going, keep your head down. You'll make it. You made it yesterday, you'll make it today. it. I love hearing this stuff. And this one is a very generalized question. I get all sorts of responses from it and I ask every guest the same question. What would you say is the biggest stigma when it comes to mental health? So I shared a little bit earlier about I want to bring light and the opposite of light, of course, is darkness. And there's a lot of people that's like I if if I was to ask and pull my neighbors, if I was to pull anybody in my church. anybody in my colleagues, if I was to poll them and ask them, hey, do you think that I suffer from mental health? I bet you most of them would say, no, dude, you're like one of the most solid guys we know. Like you're just, always positive, always have. And I'm telling you behind closed doors, I have demons, dude. I have demons that scream in my ear. And so it's darkness. I feel like the one of the biggest things about mental health stigmas is that you're the only one going through it and nobody knows and nobody cares and I think that's that's that one of the biggest lies I bet everybody on your street whether and every one of your co-workers and every one of your church people that you go to church with I bet every single one of them has a demon or two or three that they're fighting every single day or at least regularly and so I feel like the more we bring it to light we say look I'm suffering I'm struggling And it's okay to deal with this. Again, earlier I shared the problem like, hey, I'm suffering and this is why. Okay, what can we do to find a solution? And live for, we need to validate the problem. Like the problem is real. Your mental health is real. There's anxiety, the depression, the sadness, the voices, they're real. Like don't, don't discount that. Don't live there though. Get out of there as fast as possible. and start to build on a solution to get out of it because the devil wants to keep you isolated and alone and in the dark and God wants you to be with your community with your people in the light and that's um I don't know if you've ever gotten an answer like that but that's what I would say No, I think that's great. And it's, it's crazy to me because like since doing this podcast, I thought I was alone and I was the only one out there that had these, story to tell. And the longer I do it, the more I realized like, no, everybody out there suffering. And I mean, it's very rare that I hear somebody oh say no, like I've never suffered from a mental health problem because to me, some of those people who don't think they're suffering, maybe they just don't know what the symptoms are. Like that's really my, that's really my thought on it. It was like, you show some of the signs, you just don't know that you're showing the signs. Right? It's true. I think there's a lot more people than, yeah, there's a lot more than we realize. Absolutely. Yeah, I totally agree with you. Last thing I have here is we've discussed quite a bit tonight. Is there anything that we have not discussed that you would like to bring up? Um, I think, you know, as a final thought, maybe just faith over fear. Fear is false evidence appearing real and faith is, something that can, whether you have faith in, in God and Jesus, or you have faith in your own ability to kind of captain your life. and, you know, I do follow, I do follow the scriptures, I love the scriptures, I love God and Jesus a lot. I also have a great appreciation for the Stoics, the Stoic philosophers. They have an absolutely fantastic thing to do. just faith over fear and recognize that every time the voices tell you that you can't do it, it's really a lie. It really is a lie. You can, you can do it, you can overcome. because if I can do it, one of the greatest things that I could hear someone say is if Paris could do it, man, I could really do it. Does that make sense? Like if somebody's like, well, if a guy like Paris can do that, boy, I could probably do it 10 times better. Do it, please go do it. I just wanna instill in people the belief that they can do it, they can overcome. Whatever the challenge is, they can overcome it. Awesome, I love it. Well, Paris, thank you so much for taking time out of your night to chat with me. No, it's been a pleasure, absolutely a pleasure. I hope we continue to develop a relationship and chat and maybe even do this again in some, maybe when you're on episode 300, I can come back and. uh writing down a list of people that I like. There's so many people that like I want to keep in contact with. So I think it's awesome. Well, thank you for joining us today on this journey of truth, healing and hope. If today's episode resonated with you, remember you're not alone and your story matters. Keep showing up for yourself. Show yourself some gratitude. Don't be afraid to reach out for support. Please follow us on Instagram, share our show, do whatever it is. You do all social media because the best thing you can do for us right now is get our name out there. Thanks again for listening. Until next time.