Distinguishing Between Things “I Don’t Like” and Things “That Aren’t True”

I’ve noticed a recurring and troublesome phenomenon in my peer group in particular and throughout our culture at large. People seem to be confusing and conflating the concept of labeling something—a fact, a policy, an idea, or a concept, for example—as something that “isn’t true,” when in reality what they mean is “I don’t like it.” In my experience, the ability to draw accurate distinctions between these two conclusions is of critical importance. 

The failure to distinguish between the two often leads to wasted effort and adverse (or at least unintended) outcomes. This makes sense: when you dedicate time and effort to proving as untrue something that is patently true, you will waste time and effort and ultimately not get the result that you want (unless of course you are able to manipulate the evidence and convince others of a fabricated “truth,” but that’s another situation). 

We are seeing a lot of this confusion in the political arena now: one side or the other attacks a fact or a policy that they “don’t like” because it doesn’t feel good or is too harsh, whatever, by arguing that it “isn’t true.” I’ll avoid for now going into what these issues are—this is after all supposed to be a personal-finance-focused blog and not a political one—but here’s a generally applicable tip: if you’re confronted with rock-solid evidence that something is so, then you really should consider whether it is in fact so. You may not like it, but no amount of not liking it will make it not so. 

And here’s where the confusion of these two labels is particularly deleterious: there are things in this world that are true and that you don’t like, but that you could change (and make not true) if you worked at it. But because you confused it at the outset as something that wasn’t true, you have no hope of changing the reality. In this sense the condition is similar to a failed medical diagnosis: if you don’t recognize that there’s a malady, then you have no ability or likelihood to cure it. 

Nowhere is this erroneous-diagnosis problem more relevant than in personal financial management. Many people do not like the idea (now confirmed fact) that frugality, simplified lifestyle, and behavioral management can lead to wealth and financial independence (i.e., Freedom), but that’s a completely different thing than concluding that it isn’t true. This was the value and beauty of work contained in the book The Millionaire Next Door: it proves the fact with hard data, thereby forcing some groups of people (those that are intellectually honest) to re-class this empirical fact from the “it’s not true” bucket to the “I don’t like it” bucket. And it’s cool if you don’t like it—you’re free to not like it and behave accordingly—but you play the part of a fool in trying to yourself and those around you that “it isn’t true.” 

Field Study

Here are a few other statements in the personal finance arena (based on real life in my area here in Freedomville, an upper-middle-class suburb) that are often mis-classified by the status-seeking Working Joes. As you read these consider whether you (or your neighbor, whoever) would declare “that’s not true!” or “I don’t like that!” when confronted with the proposition. If you’re feeling particularly randy (Scottish usage: “having a rude and aggressive manner”), maybe try pitching these statements to your neighbor that drives the $60-thousand-dollar-block-of-rolling-depreciating-steel, and note the response that you get.

—You spend an inordinate amount of money on consumer crap that doesn’t enhance your life beyond the first day after you buy it, and in short order it will be taking up space in a landfill. If you saved and invested that money instead, you could shave years off of your indentured servitude. 

—You are being financially negligent by spending large sums on exotic family vacations rather than funding significant future obligations like retirement and college costs. 

—You bought that Range Rover not because you need to be able to navigate up the side of a 60-degree incline landscape in furtherance of your objective of successfully escaping a pack of ravenous lions, but really just because you want to signal to your next door neighbor that you’re a BSD.

—Your employment provides no meaningful value to the world or to you and your family, beyond allowing you to continue mindlessly through life at maximum superfluous consumption levels.

—You selected the area where you live not based on the (so-called and potentially dubious) “quality” of the schools, but based on your need for prestige and status signaling. (Note that the “that’s not true”/“I don’t like” confusion often comes to light when little Johnny reaches the age of elementary school, middle school, whatever, and the parents are forced to admit that they can’t or won’t use the public schools in the area that they moved to . . . “for the public schools”).

—You don’t really have any idea what Barry your “financial advisor” (who used to be called a “stock-broker”) is charging you for his financial “advice,” or whether his claims that your returns “beat the market again!” last year are actually true. 

—While you assert to your friends and family that you are the millionaire next door (I mean, you have at least two copies on your custom-built bookshelves), in reality your net worth is well below seven figures because you took out a high six-figure debt load to upgrade your otherwise perfectly livable suburban home to include a kitchen that befits a high-end commercial restaurant with matching equipment including Sub-Zero refrigerator and Wolf range. And you only know how to use the microwave and maybe one eye on the stove. 

The Importance of Being a Realist

I’m a committed realist—yet again, another quality that gets me invited to all the best parties and social gatherings—involuntarily compelled to see situations as they really are rather than how I want them to be. Irrational optimism works just fine for some, but it seems to me that if you can’t or won’t recognize the reality of the world that confronts you, you have absolutely zero chance of overcoming obstacles and changing the situation for the better. 

So as you peruse the rantings of my writings here, or on any other personal finance blog that touts the virtue of simple living, or maybe even as you read through a book like The Millionaire Next Door that at first blush really gets your ire up, take a deep breath and ask yourself: Am I reacting this way because I don’t like the message, or because I have a rational basis for concluding that it isn’t true or accurate? If you are intellectually honest you will likely find that there are things that you have previously placed in the “not-true” bucket that actually belong in the “don’t-like” bucket. 

That’s a good first step, and it will allow you to keep your thinking straight and clear, and to reach rational conclusions on the subject matter. You are certainly free to continue working and spending in order to maintain a high-status lifestyle for the purpose of impressing all your neighbors that you don’t really like. In fact, if you honestly conclude that this will be your path because, quite frankly, you just don’t like frugality (even though you recognize that it could make you rich and Free), I might make the case that this is a somewhat admirable philosophy. An honest and open embrace of a somewhat flawed philosophy is preferable to the dishonest embrace of any philosophy; the latter condition being what you get when you adopt a high-consumption lifestyle on the basis that there is nothing to be gained through a more minimal and frugal lifestyle. 

But at some point after the honest and accurate re-classification you just might find yourself questioning why you don’t like the idea—in this case the idea that a more modest lifestyle could buy you more Freedom. And now that you’ve been honest with yourself in recognizing that it is in fact true, you are liberated to openly explore the notion and think deeply about why you do or do not want to pursue it. This process simply cannot happen when you effectively cut off the internal debate by declaring that the idea is false and not true. 

Be honest with yourself—with respect to this issue and all the others that you encounter in life—and I submit that you’ll find yourself in a better place.*

*Ironically, this final statement (be honest with yourself about all things and you’re likely to put yourself in a better place) is the philosophical lynchpin of the “I don’t like it” v. “It isn’t true” struggle: many people reject the implementation of this principle ab initio (at the start) because they don’t like it, not because it isn’t true.