Paco de Leon > Quotes

“Rebuilding your credit can take a while, especially if you have some missteps that are currently keeping it out of the excellent range. Don’t sweat it too much. Time heals all wounds; it can also do wonders for your credit score.”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances

“Not feeling like you belong has its perks. It naturally fosters an open mind because it forces you to always think about other people’s perspectives. It makes being uncomfortable comfortable. And it often means I never feel like I need permission to try new things or be a new spaces because the feeling that I don’t belong anywhere is just normal. It lets me explore whatever I want to explore, be wherever I want to be.”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances

“Think of interest as whipped cream and a piece of cake as the principal. A smaller piece of cake limits the amount of surface area there is to put whipped cream on”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances

“Your financial life is like a sandcastle. You spend time tending to it, building it, and making decisions and choices that you hope will keep it from crumbling. You can control what you can, but there are always things outside of your control—like whether or not, you have the right tools or someone to help you build, when the tide will change and when the waves will start to move in. Financial shocks and emergencies are the waves threatening your sandcastle. The thing about the tides—and emergencies is—they will always come. Sometimes very suddenly as if out of the blue, and sometimes gradually. When it does come in, hopefully you’ll have dug that trench or built that wall. In the same way a trench or a wall is the best defense in weathering the shock of a changing tide, an emergency fund is the first line of defense against a financial shock.”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances

“Here are some examples: Breathwork is a really amazing tool because you can do it anywhere, anytime. Strenuous exercise, or other types of physical activity like going for a walk, running or riding a bicycle. Listening to music, using a weighted blanket, taking a warm or a cold bath, smelling something like essential oils or a flower. Dancing, humming or singing. Socializing, connecting with a loved one and laughing. Getting a massage, simply stretching your body and doing grateful flow exercise are all ways to regulate your nervous system before approaching a financial decision.”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances

“Get to know your student loans the way you’d get to know someone you’re dating — very intimately.”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances

“In 2017, 24.1 percent of the world lived on less than $3.20 a day and 43.6 percent on less than $5.50 a day. In that same year, a year when extreme global poverty had fallen, there were still 689 million people living on less than $1.90 a day.[2] This number is expected to rise as the world deals with the aftermath of COVID-19. Living off of $1.90 a day equates to living off of less than $700 a year. At the time of this writing, roughly 10 percent of the global population is living in this extreme poverty.”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances

“I’ve seen a lot of folks who grew up in environments of poverty, scarcity, and unpredictability who are traumatized but who also strongly identify as people who are traumatized and victimized. Beyond the actual external obstacles traumatized people face, there is another layer of internal obstacles when someone strongly identifies as traumatized and victimized, but wants financial stability, sometimes the behaviors that get that person to stability are in conflict with the traumatized person‘s identity. This conflict, like so many others, results in the battle between who they believe they are and how they behave. To reconcile the conflict, they can heal their trauma and work towards finding ways to identify less with their trauma or behave in a way that confirms their identity of being victimized, which again often looks like self-sabotage.”
― Paco de Leon, Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances