SeedTime with Bob and Linda Lotich

37% of people making $250,000 a year are living paycheck to paycheck right now. Which means the thing keeping most of us stuck financially has almost nothing to do with how much we make. Linda and I have coached people pulling in $250k who are dead broke. We've watched a $20,000 raise get absorbed by lifestyle inside six months and leave them exactly where they started. The problem isn't income. The problem is that most of us are working hard on the wrong math problem.
In this episode we walk through the four stages of money (surviving, stable, secure, and surplus) and the one mistake almost everybody makes when they try to jump from one stage to the next. We get into why "boring" is the actual investing strategy, why we wish we wouldn't have taken the raise, the bank-manager story that explains why the system is rigged against people in stage one, and the moment we finally figured out that the move that got us from stage one to stage two was the exact same move keeping us stuck in stage two for years.
If you enjoyed this, we'd love to send you a free copy of our book. You just cover shipping. It has over 1,000 5-star reviews on Amazon. Grab it at seedtime.com/free.
 
WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE
Here's a little of what we cover in this episode:
The stat that proves your financial stage has almost nothing to do with your income
The 4 stages of money and how to know which one you're actually in
The one mistake almost everybody makes trying to jump from one stage to the next
Why a $20k raise can leave you with the same $0 left at the end of the month
The bank manager story that exposes how the system is rigged against people in stage one
Why "boring" is actually the right investing strategy at stage three
The Elon-Musk-doesn't-mow-his-own-lawn principle most people get backwards
Why willpower-based budgeting always fails (and what to do instead)
 
BIBLE VERSES MENTIONED
Matthew 14:13-21 (referenced. The five loaves and two fish. "You bring it to me and I'll multiply it.")
 
RESOURCES MENTIONED
Mission-Driven Millionaire cohort
Simple Money, Rich Life (the book)
Free book offer
 
DISCLAIMER
Obligatory legal disclaimer: I'm a financial educator, not your financial advisor, investment advisor, tax pro, or lawyer. This channel is for general education, not personalized advice, and nothing here should be taken as a recommendation to buy, sell, or use any specific investment, account, or financial product. I'm just sharing what I'm doing, what I'm learning, and what I find interesting.
Markets can be humbling. Investing involves risk, including the risk of losing money, and my results are personal, may not be typical, and are not guaranteed. Do your own research, use wisdom, and talk with a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
Some links are to our resources and some are affiliate links, which means we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That helps keep the lights on around here, so thanks for the support.

In this episode I walk through our entire 2026 investment portfolio: every account, every position, and exactly what I'm doing with our money. That includes a full update on gold (which has nearly doubled but I genuinely don't care), where we stand with Bitcoin at $65k, why I moved Linda's Roth IRA into a fixed indexed annuity after spending my whole career skeptical of them, our real estate split between Fundrise and Roots, the Tesla concentration problem in our stock portfolio, and what happened when I ran an app that automatically copies Nancy Pelosi's trades for 8 months — including the $1,500 I put in and the 12.4% it returned.
If you enjoyed this, we'd love to send you a free copy of our book — you just cover shipping. It has over 1,000 5-star reviews on Amazon. Grab it at seedtime.com/free.
 
WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE
Here's a little of what we cover in this episode:
The Christian fund I've held for a year that's down 3% while the S&P is up 17% — and why I'm not selling
The app that automatically mirrors Nancy Pelosi's stock trades (Trump mentioned her record in the State of the Union)
Why gold has nearly doubled — and why I genuinely don't care
The Tesla concentration problem in our stock portfolio that every rebalancing strategy says to fix (but I won't)
Why I spent my whole career skeptical of annuities — then moved Linda's Roth IRA into one
What we're actually putting in crypto right now, and why 80% of it is in one coin
Why I want as few US dollars as possible right now — and what I'm holding instead
 
BIBLE REFERENCES
Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25)
 
RESOURCES MENTIONED
Sound Mind Investing (FCTE / Full Cycle Trading Fund)
Roots
Fundrise Innovation Fund
Alto IRA
OneGold
Autopilot app
Webull
 
DISCLAIMER
Obligatory legal disclaimer: I'm a financial educator, not your financial advisor, investment advisor, tax pro, or lawyer. This channel is for general education, not personalized advice, and nothing here should be taken as a recommendation to buy, sell, or use any specific investment, account, or financial product. I'm just sharing what I'm doing, what I'm learning, and what I find interesting.
Markets can be humbling. Investing involves risk, including the risk of losing money, and my results are personal, may not be typical, and are not guaranteed. Do your own research, use wisdom, and talk with a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
Some links are to our resources and some are affiliate links, which means we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That helps keep the lights on around here, so thanks for the support.

Most of us have quietly convinced ourselves that busy-ness is a badge of honor.
Mark Buchanan believed the same thing — until it almost cost him his health, his marriage, and his connection with God. And what he found on the other side of that is something the modern church has almost entirely stopped talking about.
In this conversation, Linda and I sit down with Mark Buchanan — author of The Rest of God, God Walk, and his new historical fiction novel What Is Left of the Night — to talk about why busyness kills the heart, what Sabbath really means as more than a day, how walking is a deeply spiritual practice woven all through Scripture.
His book The Rest of God is what started our practice of monthly sabbaticals 13 years ago, and this conversation took us somewhere we didn't expect.
 
WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE
Here's a little of what we cover in this episode:
Why Mark nearly burned out as a pastor — and how discovering Sabbath saved his marriage and his ministry
Why Sabbath isn't just about a day of the week — it's an attitude and a way of seeing everything
The phrase "busyness kills the heart" and what it actually looks like in your everyday life
How Bob and Linda's 13-year practice of monthly sabbaticals grew out of one book — and led to a full year off
The spiritual practice of walking, and the surprising number of times it shows up in Scripture
Mark's new historical fiction novel about a French village that protected 2,500 Jews during WWII with zero casualties
What connects Sabbath, walking, and a village that simply refused to live by the world's rules
 
RESOURCES MENTIONED
Mark Buchanan's Books:
The Rest of God
God Walk
What Is Left of the Night
 
DISCLAIMER
Obligatory legal disclaimer: I'm a financial educator, not your financial advisor, investment advisor, tax pro, or lawyer. This channel is for general education, not personalized advice, and nothing here should be taken as a recommendation to buy, sell, or use any specific investment, account, or financial product. I'm just sharing what I'm doing, what I'm learning, and what I find interesting.
Markets can be humbling. Investing involves risk, including the risk of losing money, and my results are personal, may not be typical, and are not guaranteed. Do your own research, use wisdom, and talk with a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
Some links are to our resources and some are affiliate links, which means we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That helps keep the lights on around here, so thanks for the support.

You're not careless with money. You try to be intentional. But somehow at the end of the month, there's still less than there should be — and you can't quite figure out where it went.
What if the problem isn't discipline — but a type of spending leak that even the most careful budgeters almost never catch?
In this episode, I walk through the Cost vs. Frequency Matrix — a simple framework for identifying three invisible drains that quietly bleed most middle-class budgets dry.
We talk about value decay (purchases that made total sense once, but quietly stopped serving you), what the average American home's 300,000 items tells us about how we buy things, and how this all connects back to what it really means to steward what God has entrusted to you.
This is a workshop-style episode, so grab something to write with.
If you enjoyed this, we'd love to send you a free copy of our book — you just cover shipping. It has over 1,000 5-star reviews on Amazon. Grab it at seedtime.com/free.
 
WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE
Here's a little of what we cover in this episode:
Why the average American home has 300,000 items — and what that tells us about how we actually spend money
The three types of invisible "drains" that bleed most middle-class budgets without anyone noticing
What "value decay" is and how to spot purchases that quietly stopped making sense in your life
How to use the Cost vs. Frequency Matrix as a practical tool in about 10 minutes
Why even the most disciplined budgeters often miss this category of spending
What it means to manage money as a steward — and how that single mindset shift changes every decision
The surprising connection between clutter, housework, and how much money is quietly walking out the door
 
RESOURCES MENTIONED
Real Money Method course
Mission Driven Millionaire program
 
DISCLAIMER
Obligatory legal disclaimer: I'm a financial educator, not your financial advisor, investment advisor, tax pro, or lawyer. This channel is for general education, not personalized advice, and nothing here should be taken as a recommendation to buy, sell, or use any specific investment, account, or financial product. I'm just sharing what I'm doing, what I'm learning, and what I find interesting.
Markets can be humbling. Investing involves risk, including the risk of losing money, and my results are personal, may not be typical, and are not guaranteed. Do your own research, use wisdom, and talk with a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
Some links are to our resources and some are affiliate links, which means we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That helps keep the lights on around here, so thanks for the support.

The day Jesus fed five thousand people from almost nothing — he was also grieving the violent death of his best friend and cousin. He'd tried to get away to be alone. The crowds followed him anyway. And instead of sending them home, the Bible says "he had compassion on them." Out of his grief. Out of his exhaustion.
In this episode, Linda and I walk through Matthew 14 and what was actually happening to Jesus during this wild 24-hour stretch — the grief, the exhaustion, the interrupted attempt at solitude, and the back-to-back miracles that came out of it. We also talk about what Linda walked through after her mom died last year, and why the moments when you feel least able are sometimes the moments God does his most visible work.
If you enjoyed this, we'd love to send you a free copy of our book — you just cover shipping. It has over 1,000 5-star reviews on Amazon. Grab it at seedtime.com/free.
 
WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE
Here's a little of what we cover in this episode:
Why the feeding of the 5,000 hits completely differently when you know what Jesus was going through that day
What it means that Jesus "had compassion on them" right after learning his cousin was killed
How grief and exhaustion didn't disqualify Jesus from doing miracles — they may have been the condition for them
What Linda experienced leading and speaking through the grief of losing her mom last year
Why your weakest moments might be the ones where God gets the most visible credit
What it actually looks like when you show up empty and God shows up anyway
The three o'clock in the morning detail — and why the story doesn't end after the feeding
 
BIBLE VERSES MENTIONED
Matthew 14:13
Matthew 14:14
Matthew 14:23
Matthew 14:25
 
DISCLAIMER
Obligatory legal disclaimer: I'm a financial educator, not your financial advisor, investment advisor, tax pro, or lawyer. This channel is for general education, not personalized advice, and nothing here should be taken as a recommendation to buy, sell, or use any specific investment, account, or financial product. I'm just sharing what I'm doing, what I'm learning, and what I find interesting.
Markets can be humbling. Investing involves risk, including the risk of losing money, and my results are personal, may not be typical, and are not guaranteed. Do your own research, use wisdom, and talk with a qualified professional before making financial decisions.
Some links are to our resources and some are affiliate links, which means we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. That helps keep the lights on around here, so thanks for the support.