Nourish Your Worth
Welcome to Nourish Your Worth, the podcast that is dedicated to helping individuals improve their financial well-being. Brought to you by CoLearning Books, our mission is to create educational resources that help elevate your financial literacy and self-care practices.
Disclaimer: The host is an owner and officer of Twenty Concierge Wealth Management, an investment adviser licensed by the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation. Nothing discussed in this podcast should be relied upon as investment or tax advice.
Nourish Your Worth
How To Nourish Your Future Self—With Hal Hershfield
What if the key to your future success lies in understanding your future self? Join me, Daniele, and our esteemed guest, Hal Hershfield, as we explore his groundbreaking book, "Your Future Self: How to Make Tomorrow Better Today."
Together, we'll unravel the mysteries of our brain's default network, dive deep into the concept of our future selves, and uncover their profound impact on our decision-making. Throughout this enlightening journey, Hal will share valuable insights and actionable tips to help you nourish your future self.
Discover the power behind Daniele's personal mantra, "the only way out is through," and its profound connection to our most precious commodity: time. Prepare to uncover the intriguing "yes-dam effect" and its role in shaping our choices. We'll also shed light on the fascinating "end of history illusion" and projection bias, unveiling the quirks of our perceptions of time.
But it doesn't end there. We'll equip you with practical strategies to bridge the gap between your present and future selves. From the power of visualization to the transformative practice of writing letters to your future self, we'll provide invaluable tools for self-growth provided in Hal's book that will guide you on your path to success.
Don't miss out on this transformative episode. Tune in and embark on a journey of self-discovery as we unlock the secrets to nurturing your future self. And remember, the key to a fulfilling tomorrow lies in your choices today. Grab a copy of "Your Future Self" and let's make tomorrow better together.
Buy the Book: Your Future Self
Visit Hal Hershfield's Website
Hi, I'm Daniele and welcome to Nourish Your Worth, a podcast on a mission to promote financial literacy and self-care. We seek to free people from financial fear and empower them to live their lives with more confidence and purpose. Welcome, This is a safe space to grow. Now let's get to nourishing your worth. Close your eyes and envision your future self. Who do you see? What do they look like? Now brace yourself for a mind-blowing truth That person you just imagined They're actually a stranger to you. But fear not, because today we have a guest who will help us bridge that gap and forge a profound connection with our future selves.
Daniele Beasley:Today I'm thrilled to introduce our remarkable guest, Professor Hal Hershfield. His groundbreaking research has revealed that when we see images of our future selves in a brain scan, they actually appear as strangers to us. But worry not, because he has dedicated his life work to unraveling this mystery and guiding us towards a future-filled purpose. In his highly anticipated book Your Future Self How to Make Tomorrow Better, Today Professor Hershfied takes us on a transformative journey of self-discovery and the power of conscious decision-making. Get ready to challenge your perceptions, ignite your inner power and uncover the secrets to nurturing your future self. I promise this episode will leave you inspired, motivated and equipped with practical strategies to create a life that aligns with your deepest aspirations. So, without further ado, prepare to embark on a remarkable adventure of self-discovery as we unravel the mysteries of our future selves. Welcome to the show, Howell. It's such an honor to have you.
Hal Hershfield:Hey, thank you so much, Daniele. It's really nice to be here.
Daniele Beasley:Today we're going to start off with a fun fact. You and I, we both share a unique badge of honor. We both know what it's like to lose a front tooth in the throes of childhood.
Hal Hershfield:I did not know that about you, Of course. yes, this is true.
Daniele Beasley:So I don't know about you, but I recall being on my hands and knees in grass that was taller than me, looking for my tooth, and that memory sticks with me, much like my future self's quest to find the missing pieces in my client's financial puzzles. But unlike that lost tooth, our future selves aren't gone forever. They just sometimes feel as elusive, and in your book you talk about how we often see our future selves as strangers, and this can make us choose those quick wins over what's good for us in the long run. Can you share a little bit more about that concept?
Hal Hershfield:Part of the issue is we have these big decisions we make, whether it's in our financial lives or our sort of health and exercise lives But when we make decisions that have impacts both now and later psychologists call these inter temporal choices when we make those decisions, part of what we're trying to do, part of what we're trying to figure out, is how will this particular choice affect me now and how will it affect me later? And oftentimes we overweight the present and underweight the future, in part because our future selves may seem as if they are different people altogether, almost like strangers to ourselves.
Daniele Beasley:That tie into the concept of the default network that you talked about in the book.
Hal Hershfield:One of the topics of research that I'm really fascinated by is what's, in neuroscience, is what's known as the default network.
Hal Hershfield:The default network is essentially the network of regions in the brain that are active when we are simply quote unquote at rest, but really what's happening is that we're thinking about ourselves.
Hal Hershfield:This network is something that we can use and is supportive of quote unquote time travel, and when I say time travel, what I mean is mental time travel, the ability to step ahead in the future or think back to the past, and so on. Now we also know that the brain can detect between what's me and what's not me, so we see more activity in what's known as the cortical midline structures, some of which are part of the default network when I think about myself compared to when I think about another person. Now, as it turns out, if we get people to think about their future selves while they're in the scanner, we see a similar sort of distinction, so much so that in the brain, our future selves look more like other people. In other words, the activity that arises from thoughts about the future self looks more like the activity that arises when we think about another person in the brain.
Daniele Beasley:I love the story that you shared in the book, where you could only get access to the scanner between, i think, the hours of 12 and four in the morning.
Hal Hershfield:It turns out that it's really expensive to scam people. but you get half off, 50% discount if you do it in the middle of the night, thank goodness for grad school, where you're not sleeping. Exactly, exactly.
Daniele Beasley:One of the first things that I highlighted in the book when you made the statement that you are actually a we, and I thought it was a fascinating point that we are not a central self but an aggregation of separate and distinct self. So toothless, how is still part of present. How Can you expand upon how these different selves interact and influence our decision making over time?
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, well, it's very funny that you say that, because I think toothless meat is literally a part of me, because in my particular case, for whatever reason, the dentist in the 1980s said you know what, let's just let those other teeth grow together. So it was one of my bottom front teeth. So I only have three teeth on the bottom and, as a result, i still have my wisdom teeth. Anyway, this is maybe a bit of a tangent, but look, your question is how are these selves related to one another?
Hal Hershfield:I start from the perspective that, rather than think about this self as one single entity, it makes a little more sense to think about the self as a collection of different selves, or to think of a person as a collection of different, separate selves over time. How do they relate together? They relate together because, ultimately, we think about what's called continuity. We think about the sort of connections that exist between one version of me in the past and then another version of me, and then connections between that version of me and me now, and me in five years and that self and in another five years, and so on, so that almost think of like kind of paper dolls that you cut out and then you stretch out and the one at the front and the one at the back, and they're not touching at all, but they're successively touching through the threads that's been connected by the other selves there. Does that make sense?
Daniele Beasley:Yeah, one of my favorite quotes is a man never walks in the same river twice. But it's not the same river and it's not the same man, but they're connected.
Hal Hershfield:That's right, yeah.
Daniele Beasley:I'm a huge Dexter fan and so you definitely hooked me when you were sharing the story about Pedro, who's a reformed serial killer, to illustrate that our fate is not fixed. Can you expand upon this idea and how it relates to our relationship with our future selves and our ability to change and evolve into that doll at the end of the paper string?
Hal Hershfield:Yes, early on when I started working on the book, I had listened to this true crime podcast, which is my sort of guilty pleasure.
Hal Hershfield:And this particular episode was about a man named Pedro Fila Rodriguez from Brazil, who's he turns out to be Brazil's probably most notorious serial killer and he's the inspiration for Dexter, because he only killed other criminals, essentially. Now he had this really interesting sort of story, which is to say that, after killing dozens of people, was imprisoned but then, because of the loophole in the Brazilian penal code, he was released from prison after serving about 35 years. This is crazy in some ways, because you can't imagine that being the case in America. But he at some point stops killing when he's in prison, he gets out and he leads this almost I don't know monk-like existence. He gets up every morning, he works out, he works at the bottling plant, he helps at youth kids, he runs like a YouTube channel and so on.
Hal Hershfield:I heard this and I thought this is an extreme example. It is an example of the idea that we can be separate selves over time. Now I'll note that he was recently killed, actually only about three months ago And I note that it's a sad ending to his life, of course, but I'll note that because the theory is that he was killed by somebody that clearly he had wronged earlier in his life, although I think on some levels he really is a different person, or was a different person at the end of his life than he was earlier. Other people may not see this. I love to watch.
Daniele Beasley:YouTube and when you talked about that in the book, I thought, oh, I'm going to need to add that to my queue. I want to watch some of his inspirational stories there. So when you look back to the future fan, is this kind of what was deeply rooted in Young Howe to?
Hal Hershfield:want to pursue mental time travel.
Hal Hershfield:I am. I definitely am. I'm a fan as much as the next guy is, probably To some extent. you know that movie series, but also any sort of time travel type of story or movie. It's interesting because what it's talking about, of course, is this sort of real time travel. I'm deeply interested in the sort of psychological side of that right, The what we call mental time travel moving from the present to the future, to the past, in the span of a few seconds, but all within sort of the confines of our minds.
Daniele Beasley:I mentioned before we even started this podcast that your research and your work are my North Star, because trying to help clients and it tends to be older clients to try to change some of their behaviors and assimilate to their future selves and think about their retirement and try to attach themselves and make that future self not be a stranger, that's the most challenging part. I don't know that. I haven't answered yet. Clearly, your research has identified that there's a problem And I'm anxiously awaiting the follow up to the book to see what the solution is. You talk about one of the mistakes when we do that time traveling is that we over focus on the present. Can you talk about this a little bit more?
Hal Hershfield:I think the part of the problem is that, when it comes to our ability to mentally time travel, we have the machinery and the equipment to go on these sort of trips in our minds, but so often we stay rooted or almost anchored on the present. there's so much that we end up acting in ways that almost look like we're not really deeply considering the future. If you had the time and resources to go on a trip, but you decided to just stay home because it feels easier, there can be benefits to doing that, in the same way that there could be benefits to focusing on our present selves. But the problem arises when we focus so much on the present to the detriment of our future selves.
Daniele Beasley:In your research did you look into a pain point or a problem, or the likelihood that when somebody say, loses their job or loses all of their wealth, does that pain point? then attach them to their future self and redirect the project of their future.
Hal Hershfield:So, yeah, I think that it's a really good question. Some work has shown that when you get people to step outside of the here and now by writing a letter to their future selves and writing one back, what that can do is really almost, I want to say, tamp down the sort of feelings of anxiety and intensity that are existing in the present right, Because it removes you from the here and now. I think that's getting at the start of an answer to your question.
Daniele Beasley:Warren Buffett is famously known for saying write your eulogy, because that is essentially saying all your accomplishments, your legacy, what you have done, and then, therefore, you will likely use that as your North Star to try to get to that place. But I guess I would just even say, through my experience, it's something has to happen for somebody to be able to redirect their path or attach them to their future selves, whether it's a family member has gone through a traumatic event or they themselves. Something has happened to change the trajectory of their financial lives, and then they will get to take off their hat, turn it around and nurture their future selves a little bit more.
Hal Hershfield:I think that's exactly right. It is interesting to think about in what role do those sort of big events play, and I think you're right to think that part of what's happening there is that they could be reorienting us and helping us refocus on what truly is important right now.
Daniele Beasley:Like a hard whisper from the universe. So you talk about the second time traveling. Mistake is that we think ahead to the future on a surface level, often leading to procrastination, and I would say that I sit somewhat within that 20%. I like to think of it as jump roping, where I'm collecting the information before I jump in, but can you talk a little bit about that?
Hal Hershfield:The sort of second time travel mistake that I talked about in the book is. I basically say that it's the idea that we essentially Think ahead to the future, but we do so in such a surface level way that we end up doing harm to our future selves. I think procrastination is an example of this right Where, basically, i tell myself that I'll take care of that thing next week, whatever that thing is. But if there's something that's giving me some negative feelings right now, some pain, some anxiety, chances are it'll create the same feeling next week. And it's, in a way, like we trick ourselves to say I'm thinking ahead to the future but you're not really, because if you really were, you would say look, there's no reason that future me is going to want to do this anymore. They occur in me, so I might as well just do it now, before the problem compels and gets even worse for that guy.
Daniele Beasley:Yeah, I love how you said you trick yourself, because that's exactly what you do, and I try to.
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, exactly.
Daniele Beasley:One of my favorite mantras in life is the only way out is through. And so I will tell myself the only way to get through that pile of paperwork is through. Otherwise, i'm just going to sit with this anxiety and all of this dread, and it's going to waste time, which is the most valuable currency we have.
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, I think that's exactly right. It is the most valuable currency we have, And if we just constantly sit and say we're just going to wait until somehow things get better, it's like it's not going to happen and we've just wasted time. I think that's exactly right.
Daniele Beasley:You talk a little bit about the yes-dam effect, and how does that relate to failure and anticipate the regrets of our future selves?
Hal Hershfield:So the yes-dam effect essentially is the idea that, well, i get asked to do something in some period of future time and I say, yeah, sure, give a talk at work or do a presentation or something like that. And the time passes, and now it's time for me to do that thing And suddenly I say, oh, damn it, i don't want to do this. So psychologists call this the yes-dam effect And it's again. It's a version of this saying I'm projecting ahead. I'm saying, hey, i'm thinking ahead to the future, but it's not like I didn't think about it. I said yes And then, had I really been thinking about it deeply, i might have said no, this doesn't make sense, This is not something I want to do.
Daniele Beasley:Ironically, the only way that I can get a workout done is if I put it in my calendar, and then I tend to always get it done.
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, that is exactly right. That's exactly right.
Daniele Beasley:It's like of course I can cancel it, but there is a psychological effect of when I schedule the time I will definitely get it done. But there are those times and those personal commitments when I'm like why the heck did I make this commitment three months out?
Hal Hershfield:Sometimes it's almost necessary to do things that we wouldn't have otherwise said yes to. That could end up being beneficial to us. Who might say that we should always say no to things? there can be times when I think of an example. I was a referee for my daughter's soccer league last fall and I got asked to do it in the spring, or maybe it was in the summer, and I was like, yeah, sure, it's no big deal. And, of course, when I roll around, i was like I really wish I hadn't said yes to this. At the end of the day, i really enjoyed it. I'm glad I did it. And there are certain experiences, like this, where the yes to am effect almost works in our favor, because now we've done something that we wouldn't have otherwise done.
Daniele Beasley:That said, i think there's some nuance and we have to figure out when are those moments where it does make sense to say yes, I love how you marry science with pop culture events, because when you talk about this effect in the book you use, I'm forgetting the name of the Jim Carrey movie. was it yet?
Hal Hershfield:Oh, yes, yes man, yes man Yes yes, good old, yes, man.
Daniele Beasley:So let's get to the third time traveling mistake that we fail to recognize how different our future might be from our present. Can you elaborate on this concept, particularly on projection bias and the end of history illusion?
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, i think this is like almost maybe the most pernicious bias. So basically the idea here is that it's a combination of the first two mistakes. I think ahead to the future and I say I'm going to make plans for the future, but I use my present selves, emotions, and almost unfairly project them on to that future self. It's akin to getting a gift for your spouse, where you really use your own interests to pick the gift By buying her a set of tools.
Daniele Beasley:is that what you mean now?
Hal Hershfield:Yes, i'm sure my wife would love a new projector for the TV And it's like similar right. We think ahead to our future selves and it's unfair in a way to assume that they're going to be just like us. It almost neglects the possibility for change. The reason I say this is really pernicious is because again now on a really deep level, we thought we're planning, we've really tricked ourselves here into doing something for the future and our future selves may suddenly say wait, why did we get locked into these plans? Why is this the way it has to be? It's just because some prior version of me said so.
Daniele Beasley:I thought the book does a fantastic way of laying out the science, talking about the problems and then offering some glimmer of hope and talking about the solution, because that's I'm not going to speak for yourself, but I think that's what the whole purpose of your book is to try to help individuals bridge that gap of taking care of their present selves and their future selves. Something that stuck with me in the client psychology that I did at CFP was one of this first line. Human beings are hardwired for two things survival and meaning. In terms of survival, in this day and age, we need money or green energy I like to talk about to survive. We have to handle that before we can move on to having fun experiences with our family or for ourselves.
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, i think you said that really well. No notes, that's perfect.
Daniele Beasley:Obviously, the book emphasizes on the importance of making our future self feels closer and without having to go through a traumatic event. I think it helps give some nice guidance or a glimmer of hope, how we can make our future selves not look like a stranger if we ever get to sit on one of those mind scan machines. Can you delve into a little bit more on how we can achieve this through visualizations or writing letters to our future selves? You alluded to it a little bit earlier, but you also give some really good websites and exercises that people can do.
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, absolutely. I'll start by first acknowledging that I am optimistic, and this is coming from a place of, as you just said in the prior question, starting from the perspective of trying to bridge the gap and make closer connections between present and future selves. In the book I talk about a variety of strategies I think we mentioned. you can write a letter to, and then write a letter from your future self. I love that as a strategy because it forces a conversation between selves. I actually, by the way, just today came across a research paper that I hadn't seen before from a group of researchers in Japan. This was in the context of looking at sustainability solutions, intergenerational environmental solutions. What these researchers did? I love this. they had groups of people get together to talk about solutions for creating a more sustainable society and earth, et cetera, et cetera. For some of the groups, they actually had half the group pretend to be visitors from the future, like as if you were talking to future offspring, future generations and so on.
Daniele Beasley:Wonderful They were wearing.
Hal Hershfield:Yes, i'm not sure they went that far down the rabbit hole, though I love that That exercise apparently resulted in solutions that were more future focused than when groups were just thinking in the present. I bring this up because it's an iteration of these current future self conversations and it's an iteration that I think could prove effective. There's other strategies. I've played around with age progression tools, literally looking at what you'll look like in the future. That's beneficial because it makes the future more vivid. Other researchers have found recently, if you get people to write down aspects of their self that they view as being consistent over time, that can also help bridge the gap between the current and the future. So those are just some of the possible solutions there. Of course, there's more that I cover.
Daniele Beasley:You also talk about the term of a commitment device. I remember seeing this device on Shark Tank, where you can't control your snacking at night, so you throw it in this plastic box and I thought, what? that would just be a challenge for me. I know I could get into it, but could you have any other examples of those strategies?
Hal Hershfield:OK, so this is a different sort of class of strategies. Commitment devices basically start with the recognition that there's this version of me now who wants to eat healthy or save money or whatever, and there's this future version of me who wants to look back and say I did it, i did a good job. And then there's the version of me in the middle that messes things up And that what's called the case save. That particular box was originally called the kitchen safe. It was on Shark Tank and founder quit his regular job and started this company. It was really designed for snacks and it's a digital timer on a lock And essentially you can set the timer for anywhere from a minute to 10 days. By the way, the only way you can get into it is with a hammer. Once it's locked, it's locked.
Daniele Beasley:Man, I would have had a thousand of those things.
Hal Hershfield:Exactly Now for what it's worth. People started using this for so many things other than snacks that he renamed it from the kitchen safe to the case safe. So I have one, i use it for my phone when we have dinner with the kids and it's really powerful because it just takes the temptation away. It's just off the table. Now there are other versions of this. There's a website called stickcom with two Ks. That I think is great because you can set commitment devices on there, say what am I committing to, and also you can add in a punishment. You can say OK, i'm going to give it my credit card and I'm going to give it the name of a quote unquote anti charity, a group that I don't want to donate money to, and if I fail to live up to my promises, then money is going to get taken out of my account and delivered to this political organization. Say but I don't want to donate to.
Daniele Beasley:Do you think that these solutions will change over time? because our attention span was eight seconds and now today is probably only five seconds, so do some of these strategies need to change as our brains are transformed by all of our digital devices?
Hal Hershfield:That's a really interesting question. My suspicion is that what needs to probably change is the novelty factor, and you start thinking about what messages will land for people, and I think part of the solution is to constantly vary things up so that whatever message is being deployed feels fresh Now. Whether or not that's like even more true now than it used to be, that's an open question. I don't really know the answer there, but I think you raise a compelling point there that we do need to think about meeting people where they're at, with regards to how easy it is to get distracted by the technology that's readily available to us.
Daniele Beasley:So another strategy that you talk about is temptation bundling and tangential immersion and how they can make sacrifices easier. Can you give us some examples of how to make the big small and break down those larger tasks into more manageable pieces?
Hal Hershfield:Part of the recognition is that we've got our sort of present self who lives right now, in the here now, and then we've got these future selves who are abstract, they exist out in time, but in order to benefit them we have to make sacrifices right now, and it's our present self who's constantly making the quote unquote sacrifices. So one sort of approach is to try to figure out ways that we can make life easier for our present selves, in other words, make the sacrifices that our present selves are undertaking feel less painful. You mentioned a couple of things there, so one is temptation bundling. This is a great strategy developed by Katie Milkman, and the basic idea there is you pair an unpleasant activity that represents a sacrifice. You pair that alongside something that feels a lot more pleasurable. It's another way to ensure that we end up doing the sort of quote unquote painful thing in an effort to benefit our future selves.
Hal Hershfield:Now, tangential immersion is similar, but it's a little different. Tantential immersion is trying to figure out something that I can do that occupies my attention while I'm doing something that's otherwise boring, and not that attention demanding. The example that Allie Lieberman, who's the author on that work, brings up is brushing your teeth. We're supposed to brush for two minutes. Two minutes may feel like an interminably long time when we're brushing our teeth.
Hal Hershfield:She brings up these great points, which is that you want to match the distractor activity with the target activity in terms of its attention bandwidth. If you will, if you pick something that's so engaging, if I say, okay, i'm going to brush my teeth and while I brush my teeth I'm going to watch a horror movie. The problem is that I might be so engaged by that that I stopped doing the vocal activity altogether. If I pick something that's really boring and not that engaging, then I'm just going to stop both activities, but I've picked something that's just right. So for me it's like I always play spelling bee on my phone when I'm brushing my teeth. It's just engaging enough to keep me occupied, but not so engaging that I stopped brushing my teeth. The link here temptation bundling gets you to do something and I think tangential immersion keeps you doing that thing.
Daniele Beasley:Boy, you're really talented to be able to brush your teeth and do the spelling bee with one hand.
Hal Hershfield:I just hold the toothbrush in my mouth and bite down on it. That's what you're supposed to do, right?
Daniele Beasley:Oh yeah, exactly for two minutes. So, speaking of the mental time travel your book had me journey into my realm of emotions. There was one particular story that got me a little teary-eyed. that involves you, your son and a rather interesting encounter with a chicken on the way to school. Would you mind sharing that heartwarming tale with everybody?
Hal Hershfield:Sure, when I was working on the book, a lot of that happened during the pandemic and then as we're coming out of it, and I had a feeling that I think a lot of people must have felt as well, which is I got behind on things, and so then I wanted to work more and just kind of push pull. We live a little, maybe like a mile and a half from my son's preschool, and there was a period of time where he really wanted me to walk him to school. He would ask me to do it, and so I would try to do it when I could, but it was time consuming. It's about 35, 40 minutes there, another 40 minutes back, and so at best I could get down to work at 9.30 or so. Whatever, it's no big deal, but if I keep adding that up, it cuts into my workday. Quote-unquote.
Daniele Beasley:Yeah, nobody walks in Los Angeles. Doesn't your son know that?
Hal Hershfield:Right, yeah, i should have started with that. This is not something we do here. Now, one of those days he was asking me to walk him to school and I was like all right, whatever, fine, i was like thinking that I'd be doing better for my future self if I was working and I was like all right, whatever, i'll take a little break, i'll walk him to school. As we're walking to school, we notice this sort of commotion up ahead and we're trying to figure out what's going on. And this is on the west side of LA and it's normally pretty busy And we see a big car that says animal control on it And I see this other car stopped and I see this guy and he just goes there's a chicken. And my son and I look and we go my God, there's literally a chicken walking in the road. It was like the start of a really bad joke And he thought this was the funniest thing. And the animal control guy rolls down his window and he says did you just see a chicken? And I said I did see a chicken. He said we've gotten a report of a missing chicken, and my son and I thought this was so funny, and so the rest of the walk to school, he couldn't stop talking about the fact that we just saw a chicken in the road. The times that we've seen a chicken in the road before is exactly zero, and it's been zero ever since. And when we got to school and he proudly told his teachers that we saw a chicken in the road, and now this is more than well over a year ago And he still brings this up, it's become this like folklore, this family story about the time we ran into the chicken.
Hal Hershfield:Now, the reason that I thought about this is because it was easy to convince myself that I was doing something for the future by working. There's an obvious connection there. I work harder, that provides opportunities and so on. But focusing too much on the future can force you to miss the present. And had I decided to I don't know what have an extra meeting that day, work a little bit more on a paper, i can't imagine that right now. I would look back and remember that. But there's no doubt that I will continue to remember that chicken story, probably also because I immortalized it in the book. But there's no doubt that I'll continue to remember that And I think the reminder there is that sometimes focusing on the present can also be a way of doing good by our future selves, as you end up creating the memories and experiences that our eventual future selves will look back on, and look back on in a way that gives them some sort of energy and utility.
Daniele Beasley:Yeah, I thought it was such a beautiful ending to the book because on your decades of research, you've shown all the science behind it, offered some solutions and then ended it with a beautiful story. Where it comes down to, we need to have a foot in the present as we're marching towards our future selves and caring for our future selves.
Hal Hershfield:Yeah, I think you said that really well. I like that way that you said that.
Daniele Beasley:I'm curious to know if you've developed an explicit model or framework that individuals can use to apply the concept of mental time travel to improve their decision making in day to day life.
Hal Hershfield:That's a really good question. I wish that I had a framework or a model there. The best way that I think about this is that When it comes to big decisions, like a decision of whether to start saving or not, whether to rebalance my portfolio, or whether to hire a nutritionist, or whether to make a career shift or start extra schooling or whatever, those are big decisions. They're not decisions that we face regularly. Those are probably the times when it makes sense to try to really communicate with our future selves, really try to strengthen that connection. For the other moments, the things that we face regularly, the eating and stacking and exercising and spending decisions, the ones that we face day in and day out those may be times when we may do better by trying to implement some of those other things we talked about The commitment devices or even the temptation bundling and tangential immersion and the sort of strategies that try to make the present feel a little bit easier to navigate. I think that's the loose framework with which I'm working right now.
Daniele Beasley:I'll share with you one of my mentors, and this was in the early 2000s, which I was CFO for a financial advisory firm running financial statements. I'm a single mother, so I never balanced my own checking account. He looked at me and he said do you create personal financial statements? I said no, why would I need to do that? He told me. Every year he sits down in December, creates personal financial statements, has goals and then projects his future net worth, which is I've coined it and actually I'm going to say it's in your honor a future selfie.
Daniele Beasley:I'm really passionate about financial literacy and helping young individuals embrace all of the knowledge that they can do Creating a balance sheet, which I call a financial selfie, and then projecting it on a future selfie. I can't tell you time and time again when I sit down with clients and whether we're going through a debt mitigation strategy or somebody has accumulated a lot of wealth and we're still projecting it, when we put it down on a piece of paper. We have to sometimes make tough spending decisions, but when I show them what does it look like in five years? or another life event in 20 years, whatever those goals are doing that, it gives them a glimmer of hope That's what I like to say is my little differentiator and it has a little howl, not in little pin stripes. I love that little thing. You have influenced me in that way.
Daniele Beasley:The entire purpose of this podcast is to help encourage individuals to nourish their worth, not only their net worth, but their self-worth. I always ask a couple of the same questions What advice would you have for your younger toothless little howl regarding personal finance?
Hal Hershfield:Oh, that's great, That guy. the eight-year-old version of me, i would say just keep on track. I feel like the best advice is in the financial space there for the younger me is make it automatic, figure out the ways to make the contributions that you can and then set it and forget it. I think the other piece of advice that I would tell myself is it's never too late. I love the line I came across. Dan Pink has a great book called The Power of Regret and he mentioned this line in there of the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago and the second best time is today. I think that applies. of course, that applies to our financial worlds as well.
Daniele Beasley:Yeah, but we didn't even have time to dive into the emotions. I always tell my clients you have to reset that regret. There's always an answer. All you need is a plan.
Hal Hershfield:That is exactly right.
Daniele Beasley:Do you have any mantras or quotes that you live by that guide you to your North Star?
Hal Hershfield:I love that question. I have a quote that I like I'm not sure if it's like a North Star guiding one, but it's a quote that I really like, especially in business context, which is you can't get what you don't ask for. I used to teach negotiations and one of my mentors had told me that, and it makes so much sense to me professionally. I think there are times when we shy away from asking for things because we think the answer must be no. If you don't ask, you can't get it. and sometimes the answer is no, but you would never have known that unless you did ask. I think that's been a really useful mantra, if you will, for me.
Daniele Beasley:Yeah, I love that. I always try to quiet my inner critic, and that goes along with that statement. Finally, if there's one key takeaway that you want our listeners to remember from our conversation today, especially as it pertains to nourishing their worth, what would it be?
Hal Hershfield:I think that it's okay to think of our future selves as if they're other people. What matters is the connection and the relationship that we feel with them. I think keeping that in mind can be really powerful in guiding us with the decisions that we have moving forward.
Daniele Beasley:I thank you so much for joining me today. It's been an absolute true pleasure and I've been fangirling preparing for this, and I thank you for your inspiration and your research that has helped me in my professional life.
Hal Hershfield:Hey, thanks so much, Daniele, it was really great talking to you.
Daniele Beasley:I hope you're feeling as inspired as I am after that incredible conversation with Hal. The insights he shared are truly life-changing. We learned that our future selves are not just distant versions of ourselves, but individuals who deserve attention and care. By embracing the power of mental time travel, we can make decisions today that shape a brighter tomorrow. From temptation bundling to tangential immersion, professor Hirschfeld gave us practical strategies to bridge the gap between our future actions and our future goals. It's all about finding that sweet spot of engagement that keeps us committed to activities that truly matter.
Daniele Beasley:If you want to dive deeper into the world of decision-making and unlock your full potential, i highly recommend grabbing a copy of his book Your Future Self How to Make Tomorrow Better Today. It's a game changer that will revolutionize the way you approach your life and your future. And let me just share a personal story with you. Hal has been a guiding light in my professional journey. As his former student, i've witnessed firsthand the transformative power of his work.
Daniele Beasley:When I found out about his book, i must admit I was a little nervous to reach out to ask him to be a guest on the show, but I took a leap of faith and the rest is her story.
Daniele Beasley:So go out there, nurse your future self and make the most out of every decision you make. Remember your choices today, have the power to transform your tomorrow, and don't forget his powerful mantra you can't get what you don't ask for. I would greatly appreciate it if you could take a moment to write a review of the show and share it with your friends. Your support means the world to me as I continue to create thought-provoking episodes that bridge the science between unlocking the power of combining learning and creativity, engaging both the left brain and the right brain. Until next time, keep nurturing your future self and embracing the power of self-care and financial well-being. Together, let's nurse your worth and create a life filled with purpose and fulfillment. Bye.
