Chief Endurance Officer

CEO_Matt Morizio
===

[00:00:00]

Greg McDonough: Welcome to the Chief Endurance Officer Podcast. I am super excited for our guest today. He is an impressive athlete. Entrepreneur, played five seasons of professional baseball with the Kansas City Royals then transitioned into coaching leading a 15 U team to a top three finish in the CABA World Series channels.

That same drive to helping high performers change their relationship with their money. So they can transform their lives. He teaches his clients to think, act differently, to break free of their old patterns, and build wealth from the inside out. Please welcome the CEO of Reconstructing Wealth. Matt Morizio.

Matt Morizio: Wow,

Greg McDonough: to the

Matt Morizio: appreciate that intro. That makes me sound maybe cooler than I am. I did not compete nearly double digit Ironman, so I don't know [00:01:00] who's the real athlete here, so we'll just leave it at that.

Greg McDonough: we could, we could switch seats one of these days and, and I could, uh, sit in a hot seat. But before we do that, Matt, and as a finance guy, I'm really excited about jumping into some details today. But before that, Matt, I'd love talking about the endurance mindset and I'd, I'd like to know how your endurance mindset has impacted your life unexpectedly.

Matt Morizio: I guess I've always had the, the idea that like, I want to be the hardest worker. Um, but the hardest worker doesn't necessarily mean. The longest sustained effort. That's, that's to me what endurance is. It's really like working through something for an extended period of time. That's where endurance is.

And I didn't realize, I suppose as an athlete, that I was learning really how to work through hard things. Because in an athlete's world, there's like, they're a season. Where in season off seasons, there's, and it's only recently that I've structured my days or my years kind of [00:02:00] similarly 'cause it works from my brain.

But that's a whole different part of the story. To answer your question, I would say the last, I'm gonna call it eight years, it's been this financial journey where I jumped into this world a few years prior to that, and then I went on this financial rollercoaster of highs and lows. And we can get more into the details, but th throughout it all.

I guess that's where my endur, the surprising endurance has, has lasted or has shown up where I'm like, holy smokes, I can, it's easy to live on the mountaintop, everybody knows that. But I've lived in a valley for quite some time. I've never lived in such a valley for such an extended period of time, and I'm still here and I'm still going, and I can still do it.

Like I can still wake up another day and get myself a chance, get more at bats, if you will, and. I guess I never expected to be in such a valley season with five children at a time and, um, and still go, I guess like [00:03:00] that's where it showed up. I'm like, I think of Babe Ruth quote. It's really hard to, it's hard to quit the person who never, I mean, it's hard to beat the person who never gives up and that's really to me what have has been my endurance season, the last, call it decade or eight years.

Greg McDonough: That's a, a great quote, Matt. I, I'd love for you to go into a little bit more detail about that valley. There seems to be more, you are leaving me some breadcrumbs to ask some deeper questions. Um, can you give us a little bit more insights of, of what that, what you were going through?

Matt Morizio: Yeah, I can, maybe I shouldn't have left those breadcrumbs 'cause they're not really an easy season to talk about. But here we are. I told you before we even got on, I, I said, I'm gonna be honest, whatever. Whatever you get is an honest answer. So here, here goes. So I jumped into the wealth management world without a, without much knowledge about it, without a single client.

The guys at the old firm I worked for Beck Bode. They were I I'll forever be grateful to them 'cause they took a fire on me because I, they saw something in me that I didn't [00:04:00] see in myself and they said, we'll give you a chance. And they gave me a chance with a runway of a salary. Because they had young families and they understood what that was like.

So they wanted to make sure food was on the table. And the thought was, now I, by the way, I took a little bit of a pay cut to even get a, a significant pay cut, maybe 10% pay cut to, to jump into that world. And I was willing to do that because I recognized I'm, I'm an outsider stepping in. And the thought was in a year or so.

What I built within my practice of the business was going to be enough to sustain and replace that salary they were giving me. So it was kind of like light switches, turn the salary switch off and the, and the fees switch on and we're all good. But that was great. You know, like Mike guys says, everybody's gotta plan until they get punched in the mouth.

Well, 14 months into it that I got punched in the mouth because. The salary switch was turning off. They, they did it on like a [00:05:00] declining scale, but it was a, a significant steep decline and the production switch, we'll call it like the fees that I was charging, that, that did not offset nearly what I needed to sus support a family.

I was living in Massachusetts at the time, called it eight years ago-ish, and I had five children, so a family of seven as a sole provider. The salary ended up looking something like. Call it 50 K because there's not enough to, to provide food and lifestyle for a family. So what ended up happening was savings immediately depleted.

I cashed in these old, uh, stocks that I was given, like at and t stock. My grandfather used to work for them, so he gifted me some when I was born. That's gone. Um, I opened up a couple credit cards. Those went to the tops and there was this part, there was a, there was a time in there where I went on this road trip to New York with Jim Bode, who was one of the founders there, and [00:06:00] we were going to the Salvation Army in New York.

He speak, he would speak to them. They had this annual retirement conference and he would go and speak to them, and I wa I was there to observe and to learn and to help out, whatever, however I could. Well, in that trip, drive, we'll call it, to New York and back from Massachusetts to New York, back to Massachusetts.

Ha we stopped for like half a dozen coffees, which is my love language. I love that. Um, the problem is if, or or was, if, if at any point he didn't offer to pick up the coffee, I literally could not have bought the coffees for the people. I would've had to make up some excuse. So like, oh, shoot, Mike, I can't, or I don't even know what I was gonna say.

I was just praying. He didn't ask me to pick up the tab ever. Thank God he didn't. Um, because I couldn't have afforded it. I had just enough to cover the, the mortgage payment the next week, but then I was in the midst of this refinance because now I learned the language of money. I understood how it worked.

[00:07:00] Here I am just trying to find different levers to pull the savings lever, the old investments lever, the credit card lever, that's not a great one, but you know, they're there kind of like a, just in case of emergency, you break glass, right. I broke that glass pretty good. You know, I broke a lot of glass. Um, and the next lever I had at my disposal was a home equity refinance, like a home refinance, where I was gonna cash out some of the equity in my home to pay off some of those debts and be able to like, extend the runway.

Well, if anybody's ever gone through a refinance, it's a lot like a, a closing, if you buy a home, it takes a while, 30 days or so. So we're done with that road trip and I'm paid the next mortgage. I thought the refinance was gonna happen by then and it didn't and it just hadn't closed yet. It was in process.

Just there was no issues. It was just taking long and I didn't have any anywhere to [00:08:00] turn. So I legitimately at that moment. Now picture this, I'm like early thirties, five children. I'm supposed to have it figured out. I have a house. And I had to call my mom and say, look, I just need to borrow your credit card.

I think it's only gonna be a couple weeks, but I, I gotta buy groceries and I can't do it. Uh, I'm in a tight spot, you know, I didn't explain it to her. It's embarrassing to talk about. Um, but I had to go there and I had to borrow her card. And eventually the refinance happened and the runway extended a bit.

But that valley season has lasted in, you know, two. You know, it's gone away and it's come back. And this entrepreneurial journey is not for the, for the faint of heart. We'll put it that way. Um, all the while though, I will say like, I have learned how the game of money works and recognized like you can make it through, like we started the endurance of lasting and sustaining those things so long as you understand the rules of the game.

You could stay in the game [00:09:00] and it's hard to beat somebody who's not gonna stay in the game. So that's really what it would boil down to. I stayed in the game despite, man, that's a hard time. Like imagine that Headspace where I am coaching and helping people as a licensed financial advisor, how to use their money effectively for their future.

Selling that dream for them through, I mean, realistically calling it like their future a dream, because it is like that's what we're working towards. Meanwhile, I'm living this financial nightmare at at home and I had to like live in that head space and split 'em apart and be okay selling the dream, living the nightmare simultaneously.

Greg McDonough: Well, Matt, thanks for sharing that. Um, you got my palm sweating just thinking about. They upped the down. Um, you know, I've got similar stories with mortgage refinancing and like, it just that financial distraction and that worry is such a burden to carry for anybody, [00:10:00] right? It's like, how am I gonna my kids tomorrow?

How am I gonna pay the rent? How am I gonna pay the mortgage? And it is that endurance mindset that kind of keeps you standing up and saying, Hey, to your point. stay in the game. Let's understand the rules. Let's you, you know, leverage these rules in a way that that kind of extends the runway and extends the runway.

Almost like a finish line, right? It's like, Hey, it's getting closer, we

Matt Morizio: Yeah.

Greg McDonough: it's a little further away and then it's getting closer. But I'd

Matt Morizio: Yeah.

Greg McDonough: Know, um, how you, using that experience mentioned your clients and, and selling the dream and talking about their financial future. Um, your approach to financial management is different than others that I've chatted

Matt Morizio: Hmm.

Greg McDonough: Love to know how that experience, your personal experience sort of has helped you sort of your philosophy for financial management.

Matt Morizio: You know, that's a really insightful question. I, uh, I, I think about this quote by the founder of a company called Brand Builders Group. His name is Roy Vaden. He says, you [00:11:00] most well equipped to serve the person you once were, and I really don't think I went through that season for nothing. Just to test endurance, and I'm grateful that I had the wherewithal throughout that season to say, okay, I think there's a lesson in here to be learned.

I don't think I'm in this just to fall on my face, and this is how, this is the end of the road. So I took screenshots throughout that entire season. I probably have a hundreds of screenshots and there's a folder in my phone. Of my financial journey, and there's probably over a hundred screenshots there of, of the maxed out cards and the negative bank balances and the no savings and the all of it, you know, all of the stressful times.

As much as like, my heart's racing and I don't know how I'm gonna feed my kids. And like I have to face my wife and say, just trust me again another day. Trust me. You know, like she's wondering, when are we gonna get out of this? I was still screenshotting those moments saying there's a lesson in here.

There is, and I could tell you now. [00:12:00] That I am a far more empathetic advisor, and I will give unconventional advice because I've lived an unconventional life. Thankfully, a lot of my clients, like you mentioned earlier, they're they're growth minded. They're high performing cl, they're purpose driven families, often providers, and they'll have to live a little bit of a different life because their end goals are a lot different than I would say, what an average life.

Goal is, and I just yesterday was speaking with a woman who left a corporate career high paying job to go and launch her own personal training for women because she's gone through her own transformative journey. So I was talking with her and she was frustrated without, because it's, she's in the early stages, the early innings we'll call it, of her entrepreneurial journey.

She's, well, obviously she's well, like she's super savvy business woman, but she's in her [00:13:00] personal entrepreneurial journey Very early. She was frustrated that she's not contributing what she would like to contribute to her retirement accounts and using tax strategies that she wants because she needs to rant the business up.

And because of that valley season, because I've gone through that journey. The advice I'm giving her is not, well, let's cut costs and figure out ways to save into your 401k because that's most important for your future. Instead, I'm telling her, look, you can never match a return in the market. The things I'm gonna do for you, you can never match the return that you can get by betting on yourself.

You could put 20, do $20,000 into a coach, or to ma ad spend on marketing or something, and quite literally, that 20 turns into 50 next year. You're not gonna get that in the market. On a banner year, a 20% year in the market, you're gonna get an extra four grand, not an extra 30 that you potentially could get.

And she, at the end of the call, said, well, you know, thanks for always being a champion in my [00:14:00] corner. She's like, I, it's so different than other advice I'd normally get. Like, you're my advisor, you should be telling me, stop spending so much cut costs, like live below your means and, and instead you're giving me advice that doesn't benefit you, but like it really does speak to me.

I think that just as well, finally like bringing it full circle, that's comes from my own understanding of what that journey feels like, particularly what the valley season feels like and what, what is necessary to really extend the runway to the extreme. You know, I've lived the extreme. Often people will reference extremes to highlight a point, because the extreme makes more sense when you highlight a point.

I lived the extreme. Like that, my, the, the point was in my life or is my life. So I'm able to understand what the extreme feels like. Not just looks like lives, like every day. Having to face your wife, face your kids. So, um, [00:15:00] that's I think at the end of the day, makes me a more empathetic advisor. Also gives me a perspective that's unique to be able to help people understand, look, it's just money.

It's a tool. It will come. Let's work on the inside. Change you from the inside out.

Greg McDonough: I love the way you said that it money is a tool. Um, and it's interesting, you know, I work with a lot of entrepreneurs as well, and I'm one myself. Um, and that return on invested capital to your point of your own business is it can be materially different than the stock market or types of investment vehicles up until a point where it's not, and then maybe there's a signal in your business that things need to change. But you know, as a business owner, we tend not to look at that. We don't. We tend not to look at, Hey, I only, I put in X amount of dollars and I'm getting two x net income every year. Now how I choose to spend that, I could be reinvesting it in poor decisions in my business or just taking distributions. But from an entrepreneurial perspective, business owner perspective, that's a [00:16:00] real vehicle. should also be looked as a tool and a vehicle and not, you know, I took my previous company through a chapter 11 bankruptcy process, um, and it was gut-wrenching, right? It was personal for me. Like I wanted to get this business out the other end because I believed in myself. And, but what I realized through that process is like. This is just another, like the bankruptcy process is a tool to help companies get better and a company is a tool to create your purpose, your mission, your wealth, like whatever that, whatever the outcome is. And once you realize, once I realized that it was more of a tool oriented, sort changed my perspective to your point about money and that relationship.

Matt Morizio: Well said. I agree with you that that's the inside out change that you're talking about is that you're seeing the money. Basically you're assigning jobs to the dollars and when you start to look at not, it's wrong for me to not contribute to my retirement account, but instead say. [00:17:00] This is a dollar that's gonna work for me.

It could work in the retirement account and this is what I can expect from that. It can work on marketing spend and this is what I can expect from that. They could work on paying my rent next month, next week, and that should probably not work super hard 'cause that's gonna be pretty safe. But you start to think about like your dollars as little workers for you and you can kind of assign tasks to them and then it's, you start to emotionally detach, which is I think.

If I'm gonna define financial freedom, I think financial freedom is when you are emotionally detached from your finances as much as humanly possible. I don't care how savvy I I got in that valley season, that was very emotional. You can't detach completely. You're still human. But I can tell you that rewind the, rewind, the tape a decade when I was playing ball on a four figure salary, you know, I didn't even make 10 grand.

I made sub 10. 10 grand. I had no debt [00:18:00] financially, I guess my picture looked better theoretically, but I was scared. Scared about every dollar I earned. 'cause like I lived in this worry scarcity mindset. 'cause I had to figure out how to squeeze a quarter out of every nickel. I had no idea about putting money to work or not that there was extra or surplus to use at four figures, but relationally, I, I would not have been able to, like we started this podcast.

In, in that head space with that limited understanding of how the game of money worked, I don't know that I would've been able to sustain the valley season for the length of time and have the endurance required because I had no knowledge I had and I wouldn't have been able to do it. So I'm grateful that I was simultaneously experiencing the Valley while learning how the game works.

Greg McDonough: That's very, really well said. Um, man, I'm, I'm gonna change gears on you slightly. I'd love to know more about your past, how, where you, how you grew up, how you got into Major League baseball. [00:19:00] Like, give us a sense of, of what that journey looked like.

Matt Morizio: Well, I was, I was six years old. I graduated from my preschool and I wrote in my graduation yearbook of preschool. 'cause we had one, you know, under the, what do you wanna be when you grow up? Category. I wrote baseball player. And there were firefighters and astronauts and vets and other athletes for sure.

I'm, I'm not alone in that, but it kind of became, now I'm not, I'm not gonna lie and say it was totally my declaration and that's the type of person I was like a hundred percent hard-nosed, 6-year-old. I just realized like that's what I want to do and I could, I could actually see myself doing it. I guess I was visualizing without knowing that term at six years old.

I was seeing myself in the Major leagues over and over and over. I just believed it and I loved the game and I was good at it. So that's fun, you know, if you're competitive and you win, that's fun. You like to keep doing that thing. That's why I don't voluntarily golf, 'cause I'm competitive and I'm not good at it, so I'm not gonna voluntarily [00:20:00] stink at something.

Um, so I played and I just kept playing and I played all sports. I love sports. It was like. Whatever the season it was, that was the ball in the house that I was getting yelled at for throwing. But baseball was my favorite. I was the best at, out of the sports, I was the best at baseball and I played pitcher, shortstop my whole life.

And eventually I started getting pretty, like I could tell that, Hey, this, this might be a college thing for me potentially, but I was still seeing myself as a major leaguer all the time. I just like. It was matter of fact to me, nobody else. I didn't talk to people about it. 'cause I also understand the potential or the statistics, the statistical odds I should say, of making it.

But I started to ninth grade or 10th grade, I started to talk to some people and say that I, I wanna play D one baseball. That was like my first out loud, um, admission of what I want to do. [00:21:00] Or proclamation maybe is a better word. Anyway, I, I, I said that to like family close friends, and it's interesting where their advice comes from a place of love.

I know it does, and protection and fear, but they, people do project their own insecurities on you. I've, I learned that today with seven children. People always ask me, how the heck do you do that? I'm like, you could do it too, but you're, anyway, my, my, my mom. She was supportive, but also like, well, maybe, but if it doesn't work out, like that's okay too.

And you can, you know, even if you don't play college baseball, that's okay. And other people telling me that, you know, that you should probably be realistic about this too. I don't mind you working toward it, but understand that the odds are heavily stacked up against you. And then they tell me that however, percentage of high school athletes even play any college ball.

Nevermind he won college ball. But I used it as fuel and I kept going and I don't know [00:22:00] if it was divine intervention intuition. I just, I recognized like around then that a, I can't compare myself to my teammates because they're not going where I'm trying to go. I need to compare myself to the nationally ranked recruits.

And the only way to do that at the time was like the monthly East Bay magazines or whatever, baseball America Magazine hand. Like I, I look at those. I read through who's getting scouted, what are their tools, what are their dimensions like height, weight, all that stuff. Trying to figure out where I can get an edge.

Um, so I remembered I couldn't compare myself to that, and I also couldn't do what they did if I wanted a different life. If I wanted to achieve a different goal, I had to do different things, and I knew that. So I, I guess from an early age, it makes sense why I'd start a business at 40 with seven kids.

Like I always zigged when people were zagging. You know, that was kind of what I saw because if I wanted to live an [00:23:00] extraordinary life, by definition, I had to do something extra than the ordinary, like outside the ordinary. Um, and I did that and I clung to that. All the way through to, I got drafted in the 48th out of 50th, round 50 rounds.

There's not even that many rounds anymore by the San Diego Padres out of high school, Waltham High, Massachusetts. It's an unheard of thing. I, there might've been one other in the history of Waltham or something that was drafted and it was for me, like, uh, it was a, I guess for me it, I dunno how to say it, it solidified what I already knew to be true.

I was like, see. I knew I could get there. Now, I didn't sign, interestingly enough, I was gonna go to Idaho Falls, Idaho had I signed, but I didn't. I was drafted as a picture shortstop. I had already committed to Northeastern. I said, all right, 48 outta 50. Even then I'm like, that's not, I could get better than that.

Let see if I can get better that. So I go to Northeastern fall my freshman year [00:24:00] and the coach has a meeting with me and says, look, I don't know where. You might fit in our rotation or even if you're gonna fit into the bullpen as a pitcher. And I'm in like the back of my mind thinking like nobody else got drafted.

Like, what? How can I not pitch at your level? I can get drafted, but I can't pitch here. Like, what? Where did I land? He said, but we like your athleticism and we need help as a, at catcher. There's no definite catcher right now, and your hands are pretty good. But he's, he was an honest guy. He is like, your hands are pretty good, but you're not fast enough to be shortstop at this level.

And I'm like, man, you are insulting me over and over. This is, is this, how is this, how this works? But it was great. I needed to dose a reality. He's like, but if your hands work and your arm strength is there behind the plate, like if you can take to it, I think you can do pretty well. So even so here I am following my freshman year.

He throws me in the game, like at the end of the game. This was like a meeting during a game and he throws me in a catcher. I had never caught in my whole life. Maybe [00:25:00] once in little league, I mean, and now I'm catching Division one pitchers. They're throwing hard, felt like a thousand miles an hour. It was probably like 85.

And, but I'm blinking. Every time somebody swings, I'm blinking. Like I can't, it hurts my hand. I don't know how to catch. My legs are sore. I'm uncomfortable. This whole game that like is so natural to me became all of a sudden one big pile of work, like I had to figure it out again. But after that fall season, I called, I called the scout that drafted me because.

I recognize like back in the day when I was, when I, when the people who were giving me advice about playing professional sports was my mom who is not an athlete, was, you know, teachers who obviously aren't athlete. I'm like, I know that I need to seek counsel from somebody who is farther along a path that I want to be on.

So I, I took. To [00:26:00] heart what my D one college coach said, because he's been a college coach for a long time and seen a lot of D one players and has had a bunch drafted. I called my scout to say, Hey, my coach wants to convert me to catcher. Like, is that crazy or is that a good idea? Because the scout obviously scouts professional talent.

He knows what it takes. And they both encouraged me to do it. And I'm like, well, I'm going to, I'm gonna borrow your confidence and your belief because. I don't know. I don't believe it, but I trust you no more than I do in this area. So like, here I go and I went for it and I ended up getting drafted 17th round by the, by the po um, Kansas City Royals as a catcher this time.

And, uh, actually still went to Idaho Falls, interestingly enough. So I, Idaho Falls, Idaho was in my future. Um, and then I caught for four Seasons professionally. And after that, I pitched for one season 'cause the hitting part of catching wasn't working out very well. Catching was okay, but those balls are hard to [00:27:00] hit.

Um, but they saw me pitch. I did a little, I ended up doing a little both in my college career, catching and closing. It was kind of like little league like I'd be catching all game eighth inning or ninth inning. I'd take my gear off and I go pitch. Um, but they had seen me and it bought me another year of chasing the dream.

So I got five full seasons in officially as minor leaguer.

Greg McDonough: That's great. Um, what a story. I love, you know, seeking counsel for the, from those that have been there before. I mean, it's such good advice and thinking about being an entrepreneur, it's like you go talk to your parents or you go talk to your buddy who's an attorney or somebody else who's a see, like they, they don't know what it's like to kind of sign the front of the paycheck versus the back of the paycheck.

And it's

Matt Morizio: Hmm.

Greg McDonough: in finding somebody that. been there and done that to give you counsel. It was really wise. Matt, I gotta ask you a question about banana ball. Um, do you track it? The Savannah Banana? My kids got me to go to a game this year and, and it was really fun from an entertainment perspective, but [00:28:00] I would love to know from a, like a baseball enthusiast perspective, is it something that kind of the community embrace or I just, I'm kind of curious of what your thoughts on, on that.

Uh. Whatever we want to call it.

Matt Morizio: It's like the Harlem Globetrotters of baseball is what it feels like. Um, yeah, I can only speak for me. I don't think I've talked to enough guys that have been in the game. Um, I think it's great. I love it. I think, I don't think I would've come outta retirement ex unless the bananas called me and said, we want you to play.

Not that they would because they get like big league talent to come play for special guests. They don't need me. Um, but I think it's a lot of fun. It brings a level of ex energy and excitement to the game. I don't think, personally, I don't think it's. Derailing the, the, the quality of the game. I, I don't, I'm not necessarily a baseball purist, but I, but I also think like it's, they're not pretending to be the Major League baseball.

They are very much [00:29:00] embracing that they are circus act with uniforms on, you know, like that's who they are and they live and die by that. And fans go for the entertainment. They don't go because they, they're trying to see. At the best of the best, compete at the highest level. These guys are good though.

Like they are minor leaguers. They are, they're they're talented players. They're not, they're not slouches for sure. And I think that makes it fun. Like they're,

Greg McDonough: Hmm.

Matt Morizio: They're blending entertainment and baseball and the biggest stigma of baseball is it's super boring to watch because it's just long and drawn out.

The pitch clock sort of helped that it makes the game faster, but shoot every. Every inning, every play could potentially be a fun thing for them. They have foul ball out, so if a fan catches a, if a fan catches a foul ball, it counts as an out. That's awesome. It like keeps the fans engaged. I mean, you can, I've seen outfielders do a back flip in game [00:30:00] back flip while, while, like catching a fly ball to them during.

That's awesome. That's hard to do by the way.

Greg McDonough: I can't even, I couldn't figure out if their entertainers have learned the game of baseball or were they, to your point, maybe minor leaguers that have learned how to catch a ball while flipping. But I would also suspect, like during practices. You guys are futzing around at

Matt Morizio: Oh.

Greg McDonough: and doing trick plays like so It's probably part of your MO already.

It's just now been put on a major stage.

Matt Morizio: You all of a sudden are allowed to do it and encouraged to do it. But for sure, you see I've seen some really cool, like, how the heck did you do that kind of things during practice when guys are just messing around 'cause they're crazy talented. And it is minor leaguers and former like pro, pro players that, that are there.

I, I was a mentor with the Kansas City Royals, their minor league. They had a mentorship program for a little while. And then COVID hit and it kind of, they, that just fizzled out. But one of the guys that I was talking with, mentoring, he, he actually [00:31:00] is now a banana, banana baller. I don't even know what you call it, but he's on the bananas and, um, and that, and that, that's just like, explains the talent.

He was playing double, double a ball or something and he's, he's over there now. But yeah, they, they all can do that already. I mean, not everybody can back flip. That's a special skill in itself. But they're talented. Like you can do that stuff messing around maybe in a. If you, if the coach doesn't see you during batting practice, you know, like catch a fly ball behind your back or something, not don't, don't make a scene, but now they're just on a big stage encouraged to do it.

You know, do what you can. I mean,

Greg McDonough: awesome.

Matt Morizio: The best that we saw was back in the day, Ozzy Smith shortstop for the Cardinals. His thing was to run out at the start of every game. When the Cardinals took their position, he'd run and do like a round off back flip. At short stop. That's about as as banana abolish as the major major leagues got right.

But these guys are like, all right. No, go ahead and back flip while you're catching the ball during the game. That'd be perfect.

Greg McDonough: [00:32:00] That's fun. Yeah, it is. It's a lot of

Matt Morizio: I think it's fun.

Greg McDonough: the game. Um, but it was, it was a different treat, man. I'm gonna, I'm gonna shift back to, uh, your wealth management. I'd love for you to talk to us a little bit about your firm, what your philosophy is, who you, who you tend to work with. Give us a sense of, of, of your business side.

Matt Morizio: Sure. Well, the firm is a financial planning investment management firm. People I know we started and, and it is really the goal. We started by saying, my goal is to help people reconstruct their relationships with money from the inside out. That is the goal, but people don't necessarily come to me day one to say, I think I might have an unhealthy money relationship.

Like, I think I need your help. You know, in the same way they don't go to Jenny Craig to say, look, I think I emotionally eat, you know? Instead they're like, I got a wedding coming up and I gotta lose 20 pounds and three inches on my waistline. Like, help me out. So people come to me to say, look, my finances have gotten too complex, too overwhelming.

I can't, I don't want to manage it. I'm nervous to manage it. I need some [00:33:00] guidance on it. So that's where people come to me and it's through conversation, through some of the teaching and coaching that I'll do with them one-to-one or one to few, that they start to re rewire how they think about it because they're learning about it differently.

Like the language they'll use starts to change. They'll, they'll no longer using emotional words. Like, I'm so bad with my money. I'm so good. But that was a good move. I'm, I was terrible. Those are like emotional responses. Instead, we'd say, look, that didn't go as we planned. Let's, let's course correct.

That's a very different subtle mindset change of how to use money, but we're a financial planning firm. Here's the big difference that I've noticed is, and it's been my belief all along this's, why I joined the industry with with chat GPT, with Google, with the age of information we're in. It's unreasonable and I think.

Borderline crazy for an advisor to [00:34:00] think that anybody could have or w would not have a financially successful life without them. I think that today an advisor's role has to be the guide of somebody's financial journey because anybody can go figure out what investment funds to put money in and just set it and look up in 30 years, like pick your index, put it in there.

Don't look up. Probably gonna be okay in 30 years. You know, like that's how that works. Um, so I always believed that an advisor a needs to be a guide, a coach to help people like I just shared earlier in this podcast, talk through decisions that aren't necessarily gonna be in the textbook, that you'll get spit out when you ask a question.

You know, to work through that kind of stuff, to be that guide. Like, I've been there, I've done that. Here's what I think. We should do. I also think that we live in this direct to consumer world [00:35:00] where I can order from Amazon, it shows up my door two days later. I don't need to go to a store even as a middleman.

You know, I, there's, we're, we're eliminating the middleman. In so many spots, and financial advising historically is a pure middleman industry where you give me your money, I give your money to a bunch of fund managers, they manage the money, and then I talk to you about how they're doing and if we need to change things and get paid for that.

And I just never wanted to to be that. I felt like if. Especially, lemme back up, especially with the amount of information that's accessible today in the, in the, in the dawn of index funds. I, I realize if somebody's gonna pay me to help them with their money, then they deserve to have me manage it with information that they may not have access to in a way that they understand, but don't care to do so, and don't have the [00:36:00] time or discipline to pay attention to the money the, the way that I will.

If not, do it yourself. Like if, if you're gonna be in a handful of index funds, you don't need me, right? Like there's no reason to have me involved if I'm just gonna put you in three index funds and say we're gonna leave it here and talk to you in 12 months. Right. So our investment strategy is an individual stock strategy instead of what I usually see six to eight funds that people are in.

Each fund holding two to 500 stocks, let's say people are in thousands of companies, I'm owning between 15 and 25 companies for somebody. So we're in a very concentrated. Intentionally concentrated because white papers will show that. I mean, I've read white papers that will show that if you can own zero to 15 stocks, you'll up to 15 eight.

That will, that will dissipate 80% of [00:37:00] the risk of a, of the market, the other, and then 15 to a thousand only dis decreases the potential risk by another three or 5%, so

you can spread your money out enough. Holding a concentrated position and not miss out on when your winners really win. Of course you gotta make sure the losers don't lose so bad, but that's why people are paying me, you know, they're paying me to manage money in a different way again and again, that's what we started with.

Like you work with purpose-driven, high-performing, providing providers that are on a quest to live a life that doesn't look like everybody else. And that's why the investments that they have. Mirror everything else they already do in their life. The investments don't look like everybody else's investments because it just is who they are.

They recognize if I want something different, I need to do something different. And there is inherent risk. That different could mean worse. I get it, [00:38:00] but they're all like me where it's like, okay, if I pick, let's call it an index fund, I'm intentionally choosing average. Because you can't do better or worse than the index.

You're gonna do exactly what the index you're gonna do, the average of the index. And people who share my wiring and mindset, and I'm not saying it's necessarily correct, statistically we're the minority, like we'll actually have a better chance of losing than winning. So I wanna say that out loud like this isn't, you have a better chance of putting in an index fund and not look and just burying your head in the sand for 30 years.

And that's okay because everybody I work with has lived their entire life. Like me, they've, they've lived against statistical odds their whole time. So they're like, oh, good, another one, let's go, let's go up against this and see what happens. Fully knowing like this might not work out as, as well as if I had just dumped it in an index fund.

But at the end of my life, I look up and I, I, I was in the arena. I never took a seat in the stands I played. I stayed in the arena the whole time. And that's more important [00:39:00] than potentially having a higher return. Now, of course, like the end goal is to, to do as well as we can, but it's about the mindset of like being in the arena versus intentionally buying a seat in the stands.

Greg McDonough: I love that. I love that. I'm gonna start using that quote. Um, Matt, an audience member wants to get in touch with you. What's the best way for them to get in touch with you?

Matt Morizio: Well let, I want, I wanna make sure I say this. First off, thank you so much for having me on this. This has been such a fun conversation. Um,

Greg McDonough: great.

Matt Morizio: I will say, if you want to follow me on Instagram, it's just my name, Matt Morizio at Matt Morizio on Instagram. Send me a DM that you heard, heard this conversation on this podcast.

I'll send a link to a video course I recorded. It's free it, it'll cost an email address, but it's free. It's three, probably six or eight minute videos that talk through a lot of the mindsets around money. So blocking and tackling nuts and bolts about money and investing and things you can do today. How to change your financial future to [00:40:00] eventually get to this place where you're not living in this scarcity.

Complex worried mindset. You're, you have clarity, you see it as abundant. You know there's a different, there's a transformation that this will help kickstart. I'm not saying in 25 minutes I'll change your life, but I will kickstart the process that might eventually be the catalyst to change the trajectory of your future.

So I'll offer that course for free for anybody that wants to follow me. Um, that's probably the best place to get in touch with me. My website is reconstructing wealth.com. But I, I'm pretty active on Instagram. If you wanna send a message through the site, I'll see it, it'll come to my email. I'm the one responding.

I don't have this team that's of ghost people that are, that are handling anything for me right now. It's really important for me to be boots on the ground. So I'm, I'm gonna be the one that's responding to you.

Greg McDonough: That's fantastic and we'll include those links in our show notes as well. So if anyone didn't grab it while Matt was talking, uh, just scroll down and you can find it. [00:41:00] Matt, I love our conversation. We

Matt Morizio: Same.

Greg McDonough: different. Ups and downs and valleys and peaks as we kind of expected to. Your story's fantastic.

Keep up. This work that you're doing in the financial management arena, it is unique.

Matt Morizio: you.

Greg McDonough: I love your approach. I, I encourage you to keep doing it. Audience members, if you've got some value out of our show, please like, uh, the show. Please subscribe. Let's share Matt's message, um, and get his voice out there to our community.

Matt Morizio: That's awesome.

Greg McDonough: You've been a great guest.

Matt Morizio: you. It's been an honor. Thank you.