Hi,
Happy Saturday, and thanks for being part of the Get Ready Movement.
One thing that stood out to me this week is how often financial confidence begins long before a major life transition.
From teaching kids about money through a video game to family meetings, divorce, and everyday spending habits, this issue is about building confidence through preparation.
🔍 Inside This Week
- What a video game can teach kids about money
- Why compassion and communication build confidence
- One simple move to review your expenses with intention
🧠 Thought of the Week
How we navigate life transitions depends on the systems we’ve built.
When our money habits, communication, and planning are aligned, we can move forward with greater confidence and less friction.
🎙 This Week’s Readiness Conversation
What a Video Game Can Teach Kids About Money
What if learning about money felt more like running a lemonade stand than sitting in a classroom?
Berryville shows how money, entrepreneurship, and real-world habits become more meaning when learning is interactive and fun.
🔹 Early financial habits shape long-term outcomes, often more than income level.
🔹 Games can democratize financial literacy by making it accessible and engaging.
🔹 Staying curious about money builds lifelong financial confidence.
💭 Tony’s Take: Financial readiness starts earlier than we think. When we make learning about money engaging and habit-based, we give the next generation a powerful head start.
🎙️ Mac Gardner and Tony Steuer on the Get Ready Before Life Happens Podcast (watch or listen)
➕ Also This Week
How to Navigate Divorce and Money With Confidence
Divorce is more than a legal process. It’s an emotional and financial transition that shapes identity, security, and what comes next.
◆ Knowledge and information are powerful tools for reducing fear
◆ The emotional divorce can outlast the legal divorce, especially when children are involved
◆ Clear communication helps both parties get on even ground and reduces unnecessary conflict
💭 Tony’s Take: Financial readiness during divorce begins with understanding ourselves, communication and what we want our next chapter to look like.
🎙️ Taj Chiu and Tony Steuer on the Get Ready Before Life Happens Podcast (watch or listen)
📰 Featured This Week
🛡 A complete risk plan starts with protecting income.
One of the most overlooked risks in insurance planning and financial planning is income loss protection.
📊 The reality: A client is statistically more likely to experience a disability that impacts their income than they are to lose their home to a fire.
💼 Why it matters: For most people, their earning power is their largest financial asset, often worth millions over a lifetime.
⚠️ A key gap: Employer disability coverage often leaves meaningful gaps, including benefit caps, tax implications, and limited coverage for bonuses or commissions.
💭 Tony’s Take: A risk protection plan and/or a financial plan without disability insurance is incomplete.
Note: While this episode is geared towards Property & Casualty insurance agents, the principles are applicable for financial planners, life insurance agents and other advisors.
🎙️ Why P&C Agents Should Promote AND Sell Disability Insurance with Maxwell Schmitz, Tony Steuer and Nick Lamparelli on the Assignment of Benefits Podcast (YouTube)
🌍 What’s Shaping How I Think About Money
The Family Meeting That Changed Everything: Planning with Purpose at End of Life
Why it matters: Family meetings help you be prepared before a crisis hits. They one of the most organized, loving, and generous acts a parent can offer their family, and a way to lead with both heart and intention.
💭 Tony’s Take: Family meetings helps everyone be on the same page around wishes, plans, values, roles and next steps before life happens.
🎙️ Shelby Nicholl and Melissa Joy for the Women’s Money Wisdom Podcast (listen)
Start With Compassion: Building Confidence in Life, Work, and Money
Why it matters: Compassion influences financial confidence, workplace dynamics, and the way people navigate moments of stress, uncertainty, and self-judgment.
💭 Tony’s Take: Compassion for yourself and for others allows you to be more open and less judgmental. It gives you confidence which supports more grounded financial choices.
🎙️ Amy Quesenberry and Linda Grizely on the Real Money, Real Life Podcast (YouTube)
🧭 The Readiness Brief: What’s shaping how we think about money this week
🌍 Conversations
What Happens When You Invest in Your Own Backyard Why it matters: Community investing is more relational and human-centered than Wall Street, and that's actually a good thing
💭 Tony’s Take: Community investing helps you support your community and align your investing with your values.
🎙️ Angela Barbash and Diana Yanez on the Highly Sensitive Money Podcast (listen)
📈 Trends
The Coming Trustee Collapse Nobody's Talking About
Why it matters: There is a current crisis in trusteeship with a shortage of qualified trustees amidst the “great” wealth transfer. It will be the source of mountains of litigation for the unwary.
💭 Tony’s Take: Qualified trustees have a critical role in legacy and estate planning. Trustees critically need education and training.
🎙️ Frazer Rice and Jennifer Zelvin McCloskey on The Wealth Actually Podcast (YouTube)
🛠 Tools
Quiz: What’s Your Money Mindset?
What it helps with: discover your unique financial archetype; the beliefs shaping every money decision you make.
💭 Tony’s Take: Understanding your money archetype allows you to take into account your beliefs so you can into account how they impact your decision making.
Take the quiz from Seedlyng (here).
🔍 The Pattern I’m Noticing
More conversations are shifting from products and tactics toward compassion, communication, and habits.
⭐ What caught my attention this week
🎙️ The Path of Least Regret: A Better Way to Make Decisions Under Uncertainty with Parul Somani and Brendan Frazier on The Human Side of Money Podcast (YouTube)
🎙️ Break Out Of Your Money Comfort Zone with Christine Luken on the Money Is Emotional Podcast (listen)
🎙️ Friction Maxxing: The Psychological Trick to Stop Impulse Spending with Hanna Horvath and Bruce Sellery on the Moolala: Money Made Simple Podcast (YouTube)
📖 You Bet Your Life (Insurance): Private Equity Comes For Your Annuity By Eileen Appelbaum (read)
📖 Speak It Into Existence: You Are the Creator by Julie Murphy (read)
📖 Five of the Biggest Scams to Watch for in 2026 by Ken Budd for AARP (read)
🧭 One Move to Get Ready
🧐 Readiness Question: Are you mindful of your expenses?
🌎 The big picture: A key to positive cash flow is to be mindful of expenses.
🤔 Why it matters: Monitoring your expenses will help you be a more informed consumer, reduce outlay, and get the most favorable pricing.
💡 Here’s What Works:
• Review your expenses
• See where your money is going
• Consider whether your expenses are aligned with your goals.
💭 Tony’s Take: Pause before each purchase or payment and ask whether it supports your goals and priorities.
Helpful resource: The Does It Make Sense (DIMS) calculator which helps you think before you buy. While it’s designed for kids, the principles apply for adults. From Gifting Sense and Karen Holland (here).
🛠 Resources
Access this week’s worksheet to record your current expenses and review tips to keep in mind along with relevant worksheets for expenses, debts, insurance and taxes in Monthly Focus Area 4, Week 15.
Source: The Get Ready Blueprint: A 52 Week Guide to Changing the Way You Think About Money - an easy-to-use road map that illuminates how everything in your financial life fits together and shows you how to take the steps toward financial preparedness. (Amazon) (Bookshop)
🧠 Final Thought
Life continues to evolve. The more intentionally we prepare, communicate, and reflect, the more confidently we can move through what comes next.
👀 Coming Next Week: Why Human Connection Still Matters in an AI-Driven World with Julie Pinkerton
☕ Support the Get Ready Movement
If these conversations help you think differently about money or prepare for life’s what-ifs, your support helps expand financial readiness education and keep this work accessible.
👉 Support here → buymeacoffee.com/tonysteuer
✉️ Closing
Stay ready.
Start the conversation.
Be curious and ask questions.
— Tony
