My journey to becoming a financial advisor began as I stood in the door of a barn, watching the contents of my family farm get auctioned off. My parents had decided to do something most farm families don’t – retire. I was surprised to find out my siblings and I were getting a small portion of the proceeds to help us as we shifted from college to the working world.

This money represented my parents’ sacrifices. I wanted to do right by them with this opportunity. After the farm officially belonged to some other family, my dad left a voicemail. “Heyyyy, Han. Dad here! Say… Mom and I were talking. It’d be nice if you were able to use that money toward buying your first house someday.” 

Never feeling like this money was really mine anyway, I was happy to honor my parents’ wishes. But I didn’t know anything about investing. Money wasn’t something really talked about in small town Minnesota. To do right by my parents, I thought it would be best to find an expert. So at the ripe age of 23, I hired a financial advisor. 

I had a lot of questions as I began working with my advisor. The first being why, when I logged into my shiny new brokerage account, was the initial investment amount less than the check I had deposited? I knew I had invested every last penny – so where did that money go? 

With each meeting, the questions compounded at the speed I wished my investments were. We reviewed a chart about how my money would grow over time and I listened as he stated flatly: “Based on this projection, you’re not going to have enough to retire.”

He tried to put me at ease, but “not enough” rang in my ears. I had more than 40 working years ahead of me. I received an amazing gift from my family and was investing it responsibly. I’d been working since before I was a teenager, landed a great job straight out of college, had side hustles galore – how could my advisor possibly know that I wouldn’t have enough? We hadn’t even discussed earning, spending, or saving. Tears welled in my eyes. I needed to protect this money and do everything right, but it all just felt super wrong.  

So, at the ripe age of 23, I fired my financial advisor.

I ordered my own books on investing. Five books became 10, which soon became 20, and then 40. My beloved pile of fiction collected dust as I learned everything I could about personal finance. When I came up for air after inhaling Your Money or Your Life, I had completely fallen in love with this idea: money lets me carve out space for what matters most; it lets me create beauty and enable change.