In this special episode, Connor Agnew speaks with Mike Campagna, Financial Advisor and Senior Qualified Plans Specialist, about developing financial wellness. The conversation covers essential money habits, from budgeting and tracking expenses to tackling high-interest debt and starting retirement savings early. Mike emphasizes removing shame from financial discussions, being kind to yourself during setbacks, and making small, consistent improvements over time. Drawing parallels between financial discipline and athletic training, he offers actionable strategies to help strength coaches and young professionals take control of their financial futures.
Key Takeaways
- Start building financial habits early, just like fitness.
- Automate savings to make it easier to save money.
- Track your spending to identify areas for improvement.
- Focus on paying off high-interest debt first.
- Don’t let lifestyle inflation consume income increases.
- Retirement savings should start as early as possible.
- Be kind to yourself when facing financial setbacks.
- Use budgeting tools to categorize and visualize expenses.
- Consider refinancing student loans for better rates.
- Work with a fiduciary financial advisor for personalized guidance.
Quote
“When approaching all of this stuff, be kind to yourself… A slip up doesn’t mean you quit. The same thing with your financial health—get back on the wagon and keep going.” — Mike Campagna
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Mike Campagna :
when approaching all of this stuff, ⁓ be kind to yourself, know, be kind and be honest. Like we talked about the budgeting piece of it. Be honest and then don’t beat yourself up over it when you see what that breakdown is that you’re really doing. It’s kind of like how you would treat like, you know, an athlete that you’re training. you know, you want to do whatever is going to make them keep going. And so
The same thing with your financial health. A slip up doesn’t mean you just quit and just throw all the habits in the trash. Getting back on the wagon, accepting that you’re going to slip up here and there, but it doesn’t derail the whole direction of everything.
Connor Agnew :
What’s going on Sampson Strength Coach collective listeners on today. Today’s episode, mean, seriously is a very unique episode. ⁓ And I will give you background context of how Mike and I know each other. This is Mike Compagna. He and I grew up together in Syracuse, ⁓ went to the same middle school for, do only went to middle school together for like two years or one year?
Mike Campagna :
Yeah,
I think we had two years overlap and then I dipped I was out of there Yep
Connor Agnew :
Two years overlapped. Yeah, and then you left me alone like a loser, like Stephen Glansburg. And ⁓
ultimately, ⁓ still maintaining great friendship. ⁓ And I was very excited because Mike came to my wedding, which was amazing to see him and meet his fiance. But then also thought kind of started brewing in my mind when Mike came down for the wedding. And I thought it would be really cool to have Mike come on the podcast because
I’m going give you his official title here. All right. And this is extensive. And I told him before the show, I knew he was a money guy. I didn’t know what, to what extent it was, but Mike is a financial advisor with one group, retirement advisors. His role is a senior qualified plan specialist working with company retirement plans. Is that correct?
Mike Campagna :
fifth.
Nailed it. Nailed it.
Connor Agnew :
Nailed it. Yeah. I think
the, the shrug says otherwise, excellent. ⁓ but I’m very excited to have you on the show because one of the things actually just talked about this a couple of weeks ago on a podcast was, ⁓ how negligent coaches can be with their money. We probably don’t get paid enough for what we do, but at the same time, we make these problems worse by not necessarily being smart, not thinking about the future a lot. ⁓ I know a lot of coaches are very concerned with the retirement aspect.
Mike Campagna :
No, that’s about it. That works.
Connor Agnew :
And this is obviously your specialty. So I was very excited to have you on the show. And I know I just gave you a long winded introduction, but could you introduce yourself and then give us your background?
Mike Campagna :
Yes, thank you for the introduction. That was great. ⁓ Yeah, so basically, ⁓ I, like you mentioned, grew up in Syracuse, ⁓ graduated high school there and I went right to Syracuse University. And so I went to business school there, but it was kind of like, I was very general. mean, technically my degree is in marketing and entrepreneurship, but I never really knew kind of what I wanted to do. I was like, I’m just going to be a businessman. didn’t, I don’t know.
I just was going, having fun, whatever, graduated. And I started applying to jobs and the first thing that picked me up was ⁓ financial advisor position. ⁓ So I just went with it. was like, let me see how this is going to go. ⁓ Really not having much of a financial background even from business school, which is interesting in hindsight. ⁓ But anyways, so.
started to get into it a little bit, learned the content, kind what it was all about, started to get my certifications and things of that nature. And I realized it was a field that I liked because it’s knowledge that’s really just applicable and kind of rooted in helping people, which I like. So I just kind of stuck with it. And I’ve been in that career path since.
First job I took, was there for like eight months or so, but then I got another position and I’ve been with the same company for the last six plus years. So right now I’m kind of entrenched and I’m loving it and kind of getting into specializing in the retirement planning space, which I know we’re gonna talk some financial tips. I’m not gonna hammer people with retirement talk ⁓ because we’ll get into why, but basically just…
General financial literacy is important and ⁓ just not only for helping others but selfishly for myself. So learning what I should be doing ⁓ and things like that to just set myself up for the future. So anytime I get to chat with a friend about financial things, I’m excited because these conversations don’t come up often because no one wants to talk about this stuff. So ⁓ I’m excited. This should be fun.
Connor Agnew :
I think you hit the nail on the head right there and I really appreciate you saying that because our careers are very similar in the vein that it is something that helps you out for the rest of your life. My career obviously being oriented around fitness, that’s obviously going to help you stay alive for longer, live a higher quality of life. ⁓ But on the financial side, ⁓ that is a very practical skill that will help you retire early. It will help you live again, a very high quality of life. And it’s something that we’ve dedicated our careers to so we can spend all this time.
thinking about it and we have the base knowledge for it. So it’s fun to be able to share the knowledge with other people. But like you said, people don’t like to talk about this stuff. They get nervous about it. I’m sure, you know, like I think about typical Thanksgiving dinners where people come up and they’re like, I’ve been meaning to work out again, you know, and so I’m really trying to get back into it, you know. But then I would go up to you at the same dinner and I would say, you know, I’ve really been trying to.
Mike Campagna :
Me, that’s me.
Connor Agnew :
you know, increase my financial literacy. I’d probably say it in a way worse way if I didn’t have time, but you know, I’m trying to figure these things out. So I think it’s awesome to be able for us to both get on a podcast and then talk about these things, especially with a career like strength and conditioning. So I love that we can actually help each other out. Right. This is very cool. And I think back to the days we were playing X-Box where, you know, neither of us knew what we wanted to do whatsoever. I thought I was going to be an orthopedic surgeon and fix your dad’s knees and I did not. So I apologize to Ernie.
Mike Campagna :
He’s
gonna need him soon too. You still got time to pivot, but you might have to find someone else.
Connor Agnew :
Yeah. Tell him if he
can wait seven years for me to finish my orthopedic residency, then we’ll be set. ⁓ But again, I just appreciate it because it’s fun to be able to speak with another professional that’s a master in their own field. This is going to be the most broad question you ever get, right? But it is important. What are some major pieces of advice that you give to young professionals on how to manage their money?
Mike Campagna :
Good question. So first of all, it’s tough, obviously, like get it get that out of the way. You know, when you’re starting in this, not only the strength career, obviously, I’ve been given some background on how that looks when you’re just starting out. But anyone in your early career, like generally speaking, I mean, there’s some some fields like, you know, engineering and things like that, where you come in and you’re highly paid. But that’s the that’s the the minority, I should say, not the majority. So
It’s, I think the best thing that you could do is sort of just kind of start as soon as you can with the habit building. And you could draw the parallels kind of with like lifting and just staying in shape. Like it’s so much easier once you get into the routine. ⁓ You know, same kind of thing with budgeting. Like if I go lift four days a week for like a month, I’m kind of in it and it’s easy. I’m looking forward to doing it. And I want to keep the
the routine going and it’s kind of the same thing with things like budget and habits and things of that nature. So I think that ⁓ getting started early with trying to figure out what your best practices are in terms of what to do with your money is important. There’s a lot of trial and error. ⁓ know, especially you get that first paycheck, you might have a tendency to just spend it right away. And then it’s like, one paycheck in we’re already behind like
It’s tough, ⁓ especially like I said in the strength field where first couple years maybe you aren’t even getting paid yet. So ⁓ early career,
Everyone’s heard of the emergency savings fund, right? Like the try to set aside some money, you know, but it’s so much easier said than done. So one of the things that I like to look at to sort of put yourself like in a positive direction for these habits, like just in general, is automation. So it goes, you know, with the, I’ll just use retirement contributions for an example. Like if you have a 401k or a 403b,
It just comes out of your paycheck every time you get paid and goes into your account. You set it up initially and then you kind of don’t think about it, it just happens. So things like building an emergency savings fund, like I don’t know about you, but in my bank app, you can just see, you can open up an extra savings account, things like that. Just do it all in the palm of your hand and just automate putting X amount of dollars into that account and timing it right around when you get paid.
It’s almost like your own paycheck deduction. Just as soon as your money hits your account, you got whatever amount of dollars going into your emergency savings fund. obviously those, you know, it’s tough when you don’t have a ton of discretionary income, but this is where I say anything is better than nothing. Like even if you’re trying to start with five, 10 bucks, inch that up 25, 50 bucks a paycheck, you know, if you can, you know, if your early career, you’re just starting out as a strength coach. If you can,
build $500 to $1,000 in a savings account, that would be really impressive and can be very helpful when those unexpected expenses kind of pop up. ⁓ I think the three major expenses that most people can overspend at, which are also probably three of the biggest expenses you’ll always deal with, are housing, transportation, and food. So obviously,
Housing is so variable when you’re all over the country, you know working in different places You never really know how it’s gonna look necessarily But you got your rent and then you’ve got you know, if you have a car like those are your fixed payments Those are gonna be what they are
So with food, one of the biggest things is obviously it’s so easy to kind of eat out, order Uber Eats, DoorDash, whatever you do. You know, I’m definitely guilty of it. And
I think that if you can kind of get in that habit of eating at home, that can go a long way ⁓ towards your budget. ⁓ There’s actually a couple apps that I’ve found recently that I know at least one of them works up here in Syracuse. I think they’re all dependent on geography, but there’s an app called Flip and there’s an app called Flash Food. And basically grocery stores partner with those apps and kind of advertise food that’s
not expired, but just getting closer. So it’s like they want to kind of move that inventory. And so you can get deals on groceries that are otherwise perfectly fine, but they just want to move them because they’re, you know, the, the, ⁓ they have newer stuff, right? So they want to get the old stuff out of the way. Like you can get a basket. If you can get a basket of fruits and veggies for five bucks, you know what I mean? That can go a long way. ⁓ so getting in the habit of eating at home,
I think is huge preparing meals to bring to work with you so you can eat at lunch instead of going out and getting a sandwich or whatever, things like that. ⁓ Food is a massive expense. all obviously eat every day if you’re healthy, ⁓ if you can. ⁓ So I think that’s like an immediate thing that you can look to. ⁓ If you ever spend time tracking your budget, which I think is a good idea, it can be eye-opening.
you’ll see it pop out. So that’s something I go to right away is the food. And then kind of based off of that, like things that we’re doing every day, like eating a couple other things that I know I indulge in and like you’ve told me some strength coaches like to indulge in are energy drinks and nicotine pouches. I love a Celsius. I love a Zen. There are
Connor Agnew :
Correct.
Mike Campagna :
cheaper alternatives for both of these things. Now, in a perfect world, do you not have either? Yeah, obviously. But realistically, like, OK, this is what I’m doing. So let me try to do it in a smart, responsible way. Zin is the most expensive nicotine pouch. Get a different one, right? Get the one that costs half as much, right? Energy drinks, I know a Celsius, three, four bucks. I got Aldi brand energy drinks recently that tasted just like a fake Red Bull. They were ⁓
pack of four for $3. So things like that, mean Gatorade too, like I drink a lot of Gatorade. It’s kind of my, when I don’t want to drink water, but I want to feel like I’m hydrating and being responsible, I drink Gatorade. Buy a 12 pack or whatever amount, you know, get it in bulk, right? So you’re not going to the vending machine every day or going to the gas station every day like me and buying a fat Gatorade and a Zin and that’s like 11 bucks or something. And it’s like,
You know, it’s those little things. And when you’re dealing with a tight budget, ⁓ you don’t have a lot of room to be ⁓ indulgent in those things all the time. Maybe once a week, if you’ve done well with your budget, but not daily.
Connor Agnew :
Yeah, there’s so much good stuff that you said within there that I can relate to. But I do want to compliment you on one thing, which is you’re removing the shame from the financial aspect. I listened to a lot of financial advisors, people who probably did not go through the same process that you did, but they just ended up to get a little TikTok or Instagram famous or people who are kind of seen as these paragons of financial fortitude. And they always kind of
break it down in a way where it’s like, well, you’re dumb if you do this, or you need to focus on this, you don’t care about your future, and it’s like a personal attacking way. And again, this is where I related back to the similarities in our profession. When somebody comes to talk to me about fitness, I’m never like, well, why the heck haven’t you squatted for every day for the past four years? I can’t believe you’re so sloppy to not do these things, right? What I tell everybody is literally just walk. Just make sure you’re getting 10,000 steps in a day.
and then we can start building on it from there. And I see so much more success with that. So I appreciate removing the shame aspect because I think that’s what turns a lot of people off to financial ⁓ fortitude or knowledge or literacy, if that’s the case that you’ve seen.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, I think it’s important to relate in that sense. I never want to just sit here and be like, yeah, I’m better than you because I do these financial habits and I’m smart about it. It’s not real. I have bad budget and financial habits just like everyone else. just am maybe more aware about it and maybe kind of know what I need to be doing to fix it and can maybe better attack those things.
It’s about being real. mean, like, at work, I talk with people that are making, you know, a million dollars a year, and I talk with people that are making minimum wage all across the board. And everybody’s different and everybody’s, you know, not everyone’s receptive to the same sort of messaging. And, you know, you got to just be human to people and don’t make them feel bad for what they’re doing. You know what I mean? You are who you are.
It’s just like, how can you take baby steps in the right direction and just continue to build on those habits? That’s kind of my approach to it. ⁓ Same way with when I’m trying to get back in the gym, because I’m very hot and cold with it. I’ll have good streaks and bad streaks. I’m on a bad one right now. But it’s like, I’ll tell myself, like, I just need to go there. If I go there, whatever I do is whatever I do. Maybe I’ll just do a little cardio, a little sauna or…
whether I lift or not, but just starting the habits. Get used to going and then you can build on it from there. So just little bites and it turns into better habits long term.
Connor Agnew :
Well, you know, I mean, literally the equivalent of just making sure you’re getting 10,000 steps in and please don’t let me try to be the financial expert on a podcast with somebody who actually is, but it changed my life was literally just writing out the budget. so within the first three months, I didn’t even set stipulations of, okay, I’m going to limit myself to this amount. I’m going to limit myself to, you know, one haircut per month or whatever it is. Right. I just started off by tracking every single thing that I was spending.
And it was revolutionary for me because I did not realize that those gas station trips where I’m getting the coffee, I’m getting a breakfast breeder or whatever ends up costing me $150 per month. And then that $150 now becomes a problem because I had to get the brake pads replaced on my car or something like small things that I just became aware of and it made a massive difference. And then it progressed for me into, now I’ve got, so this is for strength coaches too who love Excel, right? I literally wrote out my own Excel budget.
I’ve got four columns on it. One column is total ⁓ expenses for the month and then what I spent each thing on. And then I’ve got a green, which is like, I’ve got to spend money on this, which is my retirement contributions. It’s ⁓ stocks. It’s rent. is basic things that are like, okay, literally at the end of the day, I have to spend my money on this. I’ve got yellow, which is like, okay, I don’t necessarily have to spend my money on this, but I really, really like it. It contributes to my quality of life.
And then I’ve got red, which is like, okay, I definitely don’t have to spend money on this and I should limit this as much as possible. And so it took me a year or two to really hone in on what my habits are, what’s the best way that works for me. But just starting tracking everything was fantastic for me because it really revealed a lot.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, the thing is you don’t have to be any sort of financial expert to do that. It’s like, especially, you know, I like to deal in cash where I can, but mostly everything nowadays is on credit cards, right? So you can go back and just look. My sort of method of doing this would be I use the reminders app a ton in the iPhone. I’ve lived on it since college. I don’t have a memory. I just use the reminders app.
But it’s like set a daily reminder every day for a month at the end of the day to look back and just write down what you spent. And then you go in at the end of the month, consolidate and kind of categorize it. The way that you just described your green, yellow, red, like that is in layman’s terms exactly what any of these large financial companies would tell you. Like I could go pull from Fidelity Investments, you know, their recommended budget where
you know, 50, 30, 20, this, this and that. It’s exactly just what you described. Like you don’t have to over complicate it. And to be honest, you can make a lot of ground just doing that one time and just really just kind of taking a look. And sometimes things just jump out like, wow, I door dashed five times. Like, let’s do two times this month. You know what I mean? Like little things like that or, whoa, I just noticed that subscription hit that I
don’t need and don’t remember and I can cancel it, like little things like that. Or even like I said before, like with the Gatorades I like to drink, like you notice that, I bought an individual Gatorade 15 times. Just go buy a pack, you know? So little things, like you don’t have to be an expert. It’s just like putting a little effort towards it.
Connor Agnew :
No, 100 % and it adds up. It really adds up in the long run. And so specifically with budgeting, right? If I never had my experience with budgeting, you’re talking to me as a strength coach who’s never budgeted before. Recommendation I’ve heard a lot is just to start off by tracking what you’re spending. What would your recommendations be for the next step after that? After you’ve been tracking for a month or two, you kind of get a general idea of what your spending habits kind of look like.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, so I think once you’ve tracked, think in an ideal world, you would be able to have maybe three months of a sample size just because of the variability on a month to month. But even if you’re doing a month, I think categorizing everything is important, whether it’s the way that you described or not, but just sort of grouping things and seeing where are your biggest areas of expenses. Can I trim those? No. OK, let me move to the next one.
And just finding, know, trimming excess fat, I think. So categorization, so you can sort of visualize it. You know, I like Excel too. You know, you can change the colors of the cells and make it all pretty. It’s great. So categorizing and then identifying like, you know, we talked about baby steps. If you can go look back in the month and find like two or three things that you could do better the next month and just really hone in on doing that.
That’s progress and that’s a step in the right direction. And that extra money that you’ve saved there, 20, 50, 100 bucks, that could be you contributing to your retirement plan. That could be you making an extra little bit of payment towards a credit card or a student loan. you know, it’s a categorization, attack the low hanging fruit first and work up from there.
Connor Agnew :
Yeah, what I did too, when I first created that green, yellow, red, I would actually write down every single purchase and then I would literally put the color right next to it just to see it so I could visually see. then my first couple of months, was red, red, red, red, green, one yellow. And then ultimately I would also cheat on it a little bit too. And I’d be like, no, my third haircut for the month is definitely yellow.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah
Connor Agnew :
But then again, you start to see these things and you start to recognize and I feel like get a little bit more honest with yourself about like you said, trimming the fat, finding out areas that aren’t a hundred percent necessary and then it makes a difference for you. Now I want to talk about the first paycheck again briefly because you bring up a great point, right? I remember my first paycheck, I made the exact same mistake. so, you know, for some listeners here who are younger and haven’t gotten a new job yet, the kind of industry standard is to give you a moving stipend. ⁓
when you’re going across the country. So I moved from Tennessee to Texas Tech. I got a moving stipend of 10 % of the salary. So it was supposed to be $7,000, right? And so I get this moving stipend. I also get my first paycheck. And before they both cleared and before I actually saw the moving stipend, I calculated it as $7,000, right? And so I put it into like my pool of buying furniture and everything. So.
I was so dumb. got a King bed, like the nicest mattress with like the, you know, they, they finesse me beyond belief. They’re like, ⁓ well, if you spend this amount, you’ll get the, ⁓ you know, the bed platform that raises and, know, changes shapes or whatever. And I was like, this is incredible. So I spent all $7,000. ⁓ and then of course the moving stipend comes in and it was like 4,500. And so, yep, exactly. I learned a quick lesson, you know,
Mike Campagna :
Uncle Sam!
Connor Agnew :
So for somebody who hasn’t necessarily been on a full-time payroll yet and is expecting their first paycheck, what should they really expect of what you actually think you’re going to make? So dividing my yearly salary by 12 versus what it’s actually going to come out to when I get paid.
Mike Campagna :
So I don’t know if this is going to be exactly answering what you said, but one tip that I have just in regards to that. obviously, everyone’s aware of having a credit score, right? We want to have good credit. And having credit cards in a healthy way helps your credit score. One thing I would say to try to stick to as best as you can when you’re
early on like that just starting to get paid is not using credit. ⁓ Don’t spend something that’s not there. ⁓ Spend money that you see in your account. know, don’t because, you know, I’ve done the same thing. I remember getting my first credit card and it’s like, well, I can just swipe this and I’m good, dude. Like I’ll get paid later and I’ll pay it later. Like it’s just a later problem and I can snowball so quickly. ⁓ So I think just dealing with the money that
you have. think that the way you just described is kind of a prime example, even on a smaller scale, you know, whether it’s, you know, if your first paycheck is 1000 bucks, you know, if you want to give a ⁓ rough estimate, I mean, just take, take 30 % right off the top, and it could be even more than that. So like, okay, it’s going to be 700. And I am not spending anything until I see it if possible. I mean, if you got to fill up your tank of gas or whatever, and you
your only option is a credit card, so be it. You need transportation, right? But ⁓ I think it’s just about trying to be really aware of the specifics and don’t get overwhelmed by, my God, I got a big boy paycheck. Like I’m getting, I’m on a payroll now, I’m gonna get another paycheck in two weeks. Like it is exciting, but ⁓ I think it, you this is another one of those things where I might say all these things, but.
That’s one of those like live and learn type of things. Like sometimes you can say, I can give all these tips, but you have to feel it in order to really hammer the point home. And then when you go to, you know, pay for something or, you know, buy something that you need or we’re planning on and looking forward to and the money’s not there, you know, then it’s like, well, these are the consequences of my actions. And it’s not, again, it’s not a shame thing. It’s just like, naivety, if that’s the
proper way to pronounce that word. But it’s just learning how to deal with money. ⁓ Sometimes it’s a learn by experience thing. So just don’t be overzealous. You got to be able to get an understanding of what your budget does for you, which could take more than one paycheck, but then trying to live within that bound.
Connor Agnew :
Yes.
I appreciate you bringing up credit cards too, because this is a universal problem for strain and conditioning in my opinion. And I’ll be a hundred percent transparent here. I’ll tell everybody the details of this just because people get nervous about talking about credit cards as well too. And they feel like they got fooled or bamboozled like, I mean, partially, you know, but then at the same time, like it happens to everybody, you know, that I, everybody I’ve spoken to is at least run up a credit card one time beyond what they, you know, we’re capable of paying. But.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah
It’s like a human
rite of passage. Yeah.
Connor Agnew :
Exactly, right? It’s part of the deal. So I remember
I got, and this was another lesson that I had to learn. Like I just had to feel like you said. So I got a letter from Temple when I was at Temple that said, refund is going to be processed soon. Right. And then I got in the same mailbox, a letter that said, you are now able to apply for the Discover It card. And I said, amazing, fantastic. I said, I said, so here’s the deal. I just got a credit card.
Mike Campagna :
Sign me up.
Connor Agnew :
and I’m about to get a refund from school so I can spend on this credit card as much as I want and then I can just pay it off with the refund from school. So I had a $2,000 limit. Within two weeks, I spent $2,000. Okay. And incredible. was living the dream as a college student. was buying, it was incredible. mean, seriously, I was buying drinks for everybody. I was like, I’m the man, whatever you need. Like basically running around the streets handing out money. And so I then,
Mike Campagna :
Probably a great couple of weeks.
Connor Agnew :
rack up the credit card and I say, okay, well, it’s about time for that refund to come in. So where is it? I called the financial office and they got back to me and said, yeah, that letter was sent to you by mistake. So you will have no refund being processed to you. And so I was devastated. Couldn’t figure it out, right? But then again, this is again, I’ll be honest about this stuff. Like I paid off the credit card. And so they said, Hey, you’re such a good credit user. You now have $7,000. And I said, well, at some point I’ll be able to pay this off.
Mike Campagna :
Hey.
Connor Agnew :
So I ran up another credit card to $7,000 and then I paid it all off again. Then they bumped my credit up to $10,000. And I literally was like, no shot, it’s going to happen again. There’s no way. And no joke, I literally did it again. So if you add it all up, there was $19,000 in credit cards that I would just ended up spending. And then at that point I finally learned my lesson and I paid off the 10,000. It got bumped to 15,000. I was like, not again. So now if I’ve got a dollar balance on my credit card, I immediately pay it off because I just can’t stand to live with it.
Mike Campagna :
No.
Connor Agnew :
It’s part of what happens, and I think you bring up a great point, is until you see the money, you do not have the money. Things can happen. Anything in the world could possibly happen. so understand that that money’s not in your account. It is not your money yet.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, exactly. think ⁓ it’s, it might be a little stretch to call credit card companies predatory, but you know, I mean, a little bit like it’s, yeah, it’s the thing is, it’s like, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s almost sort of misleading in a way if you’re not really, you know, financially sound quite yet, you know, you see the number, I’ve had it happen to like, we’re raising your limit. Like, why? What did I do? I’m the same.
Connor Agnew :
They found me.
Mike Campagna :
I hate so you’re just going to let me spend more. ⁓ It’s you know, and then you that you swipe it and it works and it’s like, okay, so what’s you know, what’s the issue? I can keep doing this, but it always comes back to bite you and it’s it’s tough to dig out of those holes. ⁓ you know, interest rates on credit cards are not friendly. that’s like, yeah, kind of goes back to just the idea of like where where possible, especially early career, try to just deal in
Connor Agnew :
That’s a great way to put it.
Mike Campagna :
in debit, if you will, just the money that’s in there, not credit.
Connor Agnew :
Yeah, no, seriously. And it makes a big difference. And ⁓ I spoke to somebody else about ⁓ kind of having a side job on a podcast recently and just said like, you know, it’s very cool to finally inch into having a positive net worth. Like it’s fun to know that if I died today, I have more money than I have debts. So it makes a difference. You know, we kind of talked about just in general budgeting, you know, making sure that you are working off of debit if you can.
Mike Campagna :
Hehehehehe
Hell yeah.
Connor Agnew :
What are some other kind of mistakes that you see people make when they first start their full-time job? Is there anything that we missed?
Mike Campagna :
So I think that one thing that I’d like to mention, well, I’ll give a quick one and then another one. The quick one is just the retirement account aspect. obviously, like that’s the crux of what I do every day is help people with their retirement accounts. Like just to give a little context, our clients are the business, like, you know, ABC Corporation, and they utilize us to help construct their
401k plans and then one of the things I spend a lot of time on is sitting with employees and just anybody that works for that company and helping them navigate their retirement plan and using it to the best that they can and things of that nature. if you are if you’re early on in your career, there’s no better time to start saving for retirement, but it’s it’s tough because you’re also probably the poorest that you’ll ever be. ⁓ So it’s easy to say
you should be saving for retirement. think that if it’s in your budget, if you can save 1 % of each paycheck, again, it’s typically automated. If you can set 1 % of each paycheck to go into a retirement account, that’s huge. They are portable. So it doesn’t matter that you’re going to a different job maybe in two years, and then another one in another two years. You can take it with you. it’s not the…
moving around jobs is not the excuse to not save for retirement. you can’t afford it, I get it. I’m never shaming someone. Sometimes I meet with literal just 18-year-olds fresh out of high school that are starting a retirement account, and I’m trying to explain these things to them, and they’re just like, yeah, I can’t do this. And I’m like, that’s OK. That’s OK. Just know what this is, that it’s here, and when your budget changes, we can talk again, and we’ll figure it out.
That’s one thing early on, if you can swing it, save for retirement, even if it’s just a teeny tiny bit, because without getting into too much depth about investing, the longer that a dollar is invested in the market, the better, obviously, right? The snowball effect, compound interest, saving some money in your early 20s goes a long.
long way, more than you can even kind of rationalize, especially if you just stay consistent over the years. if you can save in a retirement account, do it. ⁓ If not, don’t beat yourself up over it, but just be aware of whenever your budget changes, if you can get that started. I think another thing that is a thing to be aware of as a potential mistake when you’re newer into a career is let’s look at like, you know, if we get to years two,
two through five. And let’s say you’re starting to advance a little bit. You’re doing well, you’ve invested in yourself, maybe you’ve got some new designations that show that you’re an expert in certain things and now you can get paid a little more. And you’re starting to make a little bit more money. It’s easy to let your lifestyle costs kind of grow with your income and you just sort of adapt and just, okay, I’m making a little more so I’m just gonna spend a little more freely, which is understandable and again,
I’ve done the exact same thing. I still remember I had to ask and fight a little bit to get a raise a few years ago when I was first starting out. And it’s like, wow, this is different, this is nice. But if you just go and spend it all, you’re kind of living the same life. ⁓ So it’s about as you start to ascend in your career and first start to see that you can
you know, get paid more and get, you know, do better, get pay increases, better benefits and things of that nature. Don’t grow out of those habits that you’ve started to build of just being smart and being frugal where applicable. ⁓ because then you’re just kind of snowballing yourself back into those poor habits. ⁓ so I think that’s a big thing. Like when you start to get a raise, the first things that you should be looking at is
Can I put a little bit more into my retirement? Can I put a little bit more into my emergency savings? Can I put a little bit more aside for the rainy day? Just those types of things ⁓ before you go ahead and upgrade ⁓ your apartment or your car. You don’t need to necessarily do those things right away. It’s nice, of course. Maybe you have a roommate, now you make more money and you want to…
Get your own place.
you know, that could be great, but then you’re back at the same place with your budget where you don’t have a ton left over to do what you want to do and maybe have fun on the weekends and go crazy like you and buy everybody drinks, you know what I mean? So just don’t let the ascension of your career influence your lifestyle too much.
Connor Agnew :
It’s such a great piece of advice and I really appreciate you saying that. It’s just, I see it happen so much. I’ve done it myself where I remember getting a pay raise and thinking to myself, okay, finally we can move out of this apartment that’s small and move into somewhere else. And then I went back and looked at my budget and I was like, okay, no, I can actually put in 500 extra dollars into my retirements, my savings, whatever it is.
⁓ And that would really, if we stayed in this apartment for another year, you know, mean, that adds up to what? That’s going to be $6,000. Ultimately that it makes a big difference. And like you say, compounding interest is a very real thing and it makes a big difference in the long run. think it’s another piece about it is it becomes addicting. Like when you really start to save, when you really start to budget and you start to contribute to retirement plans, like
It is very fun. spent many nights like just looking up a retirement calculator, you know, based off of a specific yield, like where I could be if I put this much money in versus this much money in. at the end of the day, like even with a typical strength coach salary, if you’re working with, you know, 40 to $60,000 for a lot of us, when you look at how much it can compound over time, we’re talking about a difference of millions. If you start contributing, you know, even
slightly larger amounts younger. So it’s addicting and it’s fun because then you realize, okay, I can retire way earlier than I thought I could as well.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, and it’s not always about having the highest paying job. It’s like if you’re a consistent saver and you start early and can keep it going for the long term, I’m not saying everyone’s going to be able to save $10 million. It’s not realistic or even a million maybe. But point being is if you’re consistent, you’d be surprised how well you can do with the consistent long term saving. The tough part is there’s no instant gratification.
⁓ So it’s kind of a brick by brick slow burn, but ⁓ once you start to see after a couple years the statement, the accounts going up, it’s a nice feeling.
Connor Agnew :
It’s really cool. And then I will say one of the best things I started doing was investing in an IRA immediately because I knew I could not take that money back. Like I did, I did a high yield savings account at first and then I would end up pulling money from that and using that. And then when I put the money in the IRA, obviously I could take it back out, but there’s a lot of penalties and I would really lose a lot more than I thought. having an option where I had to put my money in and I just knew it would not be smart to take it back out made a big difference for me too.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, and an IRA is a type of retirement account that makes sense in your field as well because what I was speaking to earlier, like saving in a company plan, if you’re moving around a lot, then you’re going to have to do a little administrative work to move your retirement savings with you. And the thing is that it becomes a distributable event if you leave a company and you have the ability to just take the money out. And it’s going to be hit a lot. You’re going to get a penalty. You’re going to get tax taken out, but you can take it out.
And so if you stick with an IRA, that’s not attached to a company, it’s just attached to you. And you can just automate those savings like we’ve talked about, X amount of dollars per month going in and there you go. And you’re off to a good start.
Connor Agnew :
Yeah, and it’s fun. Seriously, it is fun to know that you have a financial future instead of just living paycheck to paycheck. As somebody who’s been in both areas, it’s a lot cooler to know that at some point I can retire and I don’t have to be 90 years old teaching kids how to power clean.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, because I mean, there I do sometimes I talk with people who say like, yeah, I’m never going to retire. And you know, they’re okay with it. Me like I am absolutely trying to retire. I, I do like what I do. And I’m thankful to like what I do. But I don’t want to do it until I’m 90. Like I want to retire, you know, when I still can move around, I’m still healthy, you know, I live somewhat of an active lifestyle, and enjoy the fruits of my labor, you know what I mean? We’re all going to be
Connor Agnew :
Yeah.
Mike Campagna :
likely working for 30, 40, maybe even 50 years in some cases, you deserve to like kind of call it quits and live an honorable life and not have to scrounge up and just, you know, get by with whatever Social Security is going to be giving you, which by the time we’re that age, who knows what Social Security is going to look like. So, and that’s just honestly another side tidbit. Sometimes people ask me about the future of Social Security.
My thing is like, I don’t know. I don’t know. So therefore, don’t rely on it. If it comes to you and you become that age and you get to take Social Security, then that’s great. But look at retirement as something that you need to create for yourself with something like IRAs, ⁓ 401ks. If you are fortunate enough to find a job that has a pension plan that works amazingly as well. But you got to create your own retirement. And so it’s about,
doing it early if you can, just consistency is the biggest thing.
Connor Agnew :
But it’s literally money you can’t see yet in regards to the social security. So don’t buy the king-size mattress, know, chill out just a little bit. ⁓ We talked a lot about early career. You know, what are some of the mistakes that you see people make later in their careers, ⁓ closer to retiring age?
Mike Campagna :
Hehehehehe
Hmm later careers, think ⁓ I think later career mistakes ⁓ a lot of it involves kind of pushing off the planning piece of what what life is gonna look like as you get older because a lot of things, know, a lot of things change late career like if we assume that someone is let’s say 50 plus they may have kids that could be anywhere from
high school to college to out of college. There’s a lot of change that comes with, you you’ve spent the last however many years with a family at home, children in the house, things that you’re paying for. And now that’s all gonna be completely different. Like you get to a point where, you know, empty nesters, now it’s just, it’s you and the kids are out doing their own thing. And it’s time for you and maybe your spouse to plan.
what’s life going to look like. And that’s one thing that goes back to, you know, the retirement saving piece. The accumulation, like the saving over the years, should be pretty easy in terms of process. Like you’re just kind of, you can automate it, put money in those accounts, get it invested. But then it’s like, well, what do I do? I have this chunk of money that I’ve saved up. How do I, how do I do this? How do I spread it out? How do I make it last? So I think planning is something that
It’s never too early to start figuring out. mean, realistically, do you need to be retirement planning for how you’re going to spend your money at 65 when you’re 35? Probably not. once you know that you’re sort of on the back nine or even like the back sort of like four or five, just getting towards the end, you want to start looking at those things. Health care costs are going to be a huge thing for almost everybody in retirement.
your cost of living, like do you want to move? Do you want to stay with your, you know, where you live now? Cause maybe you’ve paid the house off by the time you’re at retirement. What are your debts looking like? Should you be attacking those instead of, you know, it’s, it’s, that’s another, you know, carrying debt is, something that’s detrimental. No pun, you know, ⁓ I know that was awesome. Great. ⁓ but, yeah, so it’s, it’s just about, ⁓ you know,
Connor Agnew :
It was a good one. I like it. I like it
Mike Campagna :
Don’t get complacent. think people kind of get in this autopilot late career of they’ve you’ve been doing it for so long and now you’re you know, you’ve you know 2530 years and kind of the same routine Going to work doing this doing that retirement and as you get later in your career it’s just another extreme lifestyle change and I think that going into that sort of blind is a big mistake that I see and and you know not even
what, not even an advertisement for myself, but like work with a financial advisor. Like if you have assets that you, you have, and you know, I’ve saved this much and this is what I’m going to use to sustain myself and my family in retirement. It’s not easy to figure out how to go about it. And the worst possible thing would be running out of money when you’re still alive, right? Now all of sudden you’re 89 and you got to go be a Walmart greeter. So, ⁓
in no shade to those people. it’s just, it’s yeah, so I think ⁓ just making sure that you’re aware that you need to have a plan, I think is probably my biggest thing.
Connor Agnew :
It’s a reality though. It happens a lot.
Yeah. Again, I appreciate everything that you’re saying because this is exactly what I wanted to have you on because there’s mistakes that can be made at every level. And there’s no shame attached to those mistakes, but it’s good to be aware of these things. And it’s good to know exactly what to look for. My parents didn’t get a financial advisor until their late fifties. And they said, if they can go back and make one difference, first it would have been, they had an opportunity to buy a Chipotle.
I think in like 2000 or something, and they said that we would have bought the Chipotle. ⁓ And then the next piece was they would go back and then work with the financial advisor earlier. You know, they compared it to having like a realty management company work with you. Like there’s a lot of stuff that, you know, you could probably end up figuring it out on your own, but ultimately when you let somebody else, an expert handle it, ⁓ it makes a big difference. It takes a lot of the stress out of it. A lot of the emotions out of the decisions you’re making as well, because you have an expert who can help guide you in those decisions.
Mike Campagna :
Ho ho ho.
Yeah.
Yeah, taking the emotions out is a huge thing, especially with money, because it gets very emotional and to have sort of that sounding board is big. I think a lot of people like may have a sour taste in their mouth regarding financial advisors, which I don’t even blame them for, because a lot of people’s first experience with a financial advisor is being like 21 and your buddy from high school or college just started and now they’re calling you and they’re selling you life insurance and stuff like that, like which
That’s how a lot of people get their start in the field, but that’s not what every advisor does. ⁓ And you don’t have to work with someone who is just sitting there trying to sell you things. There’s a lot of diversity in the way that financial advisors can go about their jobs. ⁓ And if you can find someone who’s a fiduciary, someone who’s fee-based so that they’re not getting commissions based on
products and things like that. It can be a huge help for just getting pointed in the right direction. And also, like I said, like in retirement, just understanding how to unravel everything and create that plan of here’s how we use the money in retirement and then hopefully here’s how we pass money on to the next generation as well.
Connor Agnew :
Are there any other really key things that you look for with the financial advisor? I know you mentioned the fiduciary, but anything else? Relationship-based, what are the things people should look for?
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, so to start with definitely fiduciary is a big thing. ⁓ Being a fiduciary means that you have to, are under, you are by law obligated to do right by your clients. ⁓ You know, some, it’s becoming more of an environment where that is more and more prevalent, which is a good thing. But some advisors are able to sort of conduct things in a different way, which is more based on suitability.
which can kind of be like, yeah, if I can prove on paper that this is a fit for these people, then there’s no issue and we can go forward and now I can make some money on it. think being a fiduciary is important. Like I have a couple of fiduciary designations that, ⁓ you know, I like to mention to people when I’m talking with them about their retirement accounts. Like I’m just obligated to just help you figure out what’s best for you.
and that’s the approach that you want your advisor to be taking. I think ⁓ fee-based is important. There are certainly cases where, you know, if you talk to an advisor and they present a certain product that may work for you and there is a commission, as long as they’re transparent about it and you are okay with all of the things involved, then that’s fine. But the best, I think, in my personal opinion,
way to go about having an advisor manage your money is for a fee because it’s transparent. is X percent of your assets and that is going to be what it is. And the money goes up, the account value goes up, the advisor makes a little more. If the money goes down, the advisor makes less. And so that’s like a lot of our company’s business with individuals. That’s not with the companies like I mainly do. ⁓
it’s almost all fee based. And there’s been times like if we just go back to like March 2020 when COVID hit, the market obviously was in shambles. And that means that everybody’s pay took like a ⁓ 30 % cut. And that’s just how it is. that’s, you know, that’s the, you know, the transparent part of it and the, you know, we’re in it together part of it. And in a lot of cases, if an advisor is doing their job right,
If they continue to help grow your assets more and more and more, they’ll lower the fee and continue to just be fair about it. I think fiduciary is a big thing. Fee based is a big thing. We’re applicable. And trust. think trust is huge. If you meet with someone and you’re just not getting good vibes personally, I ⁓ would try to find someone else. This is a relationship that
You don’t need to talk to them every day, but you want to feel okay with being able to pick up the phone and give them a call. You shouldn’t have to feel like, I don’t want to bother them. You know what I mean? You’re paying them, so you can call them. So anytime you can get a reference from a friend or someone that you know who’s worked with an advisor, who’s done right by them, ⁓ if you can get a reference, that’s always good. Otherwise, try to look for those main things, fiduciaries, and you can look up any financial advisor you want. ⁓
There’s ⁓ databases that list every financial advisor, shows your criminal record, any infractions you’ve done. So look them up. I’ve had people ask me about ⁓ my records and things on there, which has nothing, but it’s just interesting to know that people look it up. And I don’t think a lot of people know that. You can look any financial advisor up. do your little background check too.
Connor Agnew :
Yeah, absolutely. You know, it’s really interesting you say that because I actually just had this conversation with one of our players recently where it was clear that his agent was not being 100 % honest with him about some things. And, you know, it’s funny because we have two players in the team. One was working out for NBA teams and one was not. And basically the agent for the one not working out for the NBA teams was like, well, now’s not the time to work out for NBA teams. And then his teammate, one of his best friends, just had 17 workouts.
with NBA teams. And so it was like, that doesn’t seem correct, you know? And he was kind of a little upset about it, understandably so. And I said, you need to call him. And I said, you need to ask him what’s going on because you’re paying this guy. He literally gets a percentage of your paycheck every single time you get paid. So you need to have somebody who can be upfront and honest with you. So I’m glad that the same advice extends to financial advisors. It could be almost the layman’s agent, essentially.
Mike Campagna :
Hehehehehe
Yeah, mean, more or less it is because you’re going to, you you come to me and say, Mike, I’ve got X amount of dollars to manage. Then I say, okay, I’m going to go to the market and I’m going to look at all these different mutual funds, ETF stocks, whatever you’re looking for, these things that you can invest in. And I’m curating based on what you need and what you like and all those things, what’s going to fit for you. Then I’ll bring it to you and say,
here are some things that are, here’s a bevy of different options that I think all might work for you and then we kind of look at it together and make a decision. So it’s a team effort ⁓ and yes, it should be a transparent two-way relationship, absolutely.
Connor Agnew :
Okay, so I’m curious about one other thing that I wanna make sure we touch on, ⁓ which is a lot of people struggle with the debt aspect, as you mentioned, and a lot for strength coaches can end up being student loans. I know that there’s, my advice to every single intern is to get a GA, so just a general assistantship where they pay for your school, because I’m the one who, when you talk about feeling ⁓ decisions that you’ve made, I have a ridiculous amount of student loans and I have to pay.
a hefty monthly payment. ⁓ But a lot of times, it could be a situation like I’m in where you get paid as a part-time worker and that’s kind of essentially what you use to just survive. And then you’re paying for the school on top of that. What are some of the ways to best manage student loans or just best manage general debt?
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, so definitely great question. Obviously extremely applicable ⁓ in this case, especially with strength coaches. I think so a few things here. First of all, and it may seem obvious, but just got to say is no, no, your loan type, no, your interest rate, you know, federal, private, there’s a different structures and ways to go about dealing with different kinds of loans. ⁓ When you have federal loans, you can look at things like income,
driven repayment plans, you know, so they can be a little bit more flexible when it comes to what you have to pay versus what you’re taking home and things like that. Anytime that there’s any possible public service loan forgiveness. You know, I know in Syracuse, you know, the city schools here, if there’s programs where when teachers go into the district, if they work there for X amount of years, they can get their loans resolved. So just being aware of ⁓
what could be available to you, ⁓ whether you’re going to go down those routes or not, just the awareness of it. ⁓ When it comes to private loans, you could look at stuff like refinancing. It could be risky with possibly losing federal protections, like those income-driven repayment type of things, deferment, forgiveness, like those things. ⁓ But if you don’t lose those things, if you have a good credit score,
you can look at refinancing because you could possibly get a lower rate, possibly get a lower payment, or even help consolidate loans and just make the process a little bit easier. And I think with student loans and with credit cards, I like to say to prioritize the ones with the highest interest first. So if we use like an easy numbers example, like let’s just say
$100 per this is so not real but $100 per month going towards student loans three different ones, you know in you know, one interest rates 25 ones 20 ones 15 if you can do 25 a piece to each of those then you’ve got your extra $25 put that all towards the highest interest rate one right and you keep attacking that one until it gets down and then let’s say if you’re able to pay
that highest rate off. Now you’ve got two left. You take that entire 50 that was going towards that high one and now you’ve got 75 going towards the second highest interest rate, 25 going to the lowest still. Pay that off and then when you’re done there, the full 100 can go towards the lowest interest rate loan. So obviously those numbers are not real, but the point being just attack the highest interest rate debts first because
that interest is killer. ⁓ So that’s a big thing for me. just one more note, which could, I think it’s typically more of a student loan thing, not really a credit card thing, but automation. I’m a big fan of automation for saving, but also for paying. So sometimes ⁓ certain loans, if you set up automated payments, they’ll give you maybe a little bit of a discount on the interest or things of that nature.
Also important, just not missing a due date. automation is a big thing there as well.
Connor Agnew :
Yeah, you know, with my experience with student loans, refinancing was a great option for me because I had half of them in private loans that I knew and I did a lot of research to make sure that those wouldn’t be forgiven based off of my specific instance. And so I refinanced it during COVID, which was like the best decision I ever made. I think like the total interest was like 7.6 % and then I refinanced to 4.5%. But
in that percentage, also set up automatic payments and it came out to 4 % per month now, or 4 % APR. So ⁓ it was very ⁓ exciting to see, okay, just based off of interest, I’m paying this much less ⁓ because I was able to make a better decision. So I think one thing that kept me from doing it for a long time was I was just scared. Like I was scared to look at it. I was scared to ⁓ understand that there’s this daunting task of paying off. I mean, for me, was $120,000.
you know, and knowing that one day I’m going to have to pay these off, but just looking into it and getting more information made me feel a lot more comfortable with it. And then I found solutions that made things better. I do the automatic payments, like you mentioned, and it now, you know, has dwindled down to something where I’m like, okay, I can actually see myself paying this off one day instead of just having debt for the rest of my life.
Mike Campagna :
Yeah, it’s the, you know, paying down debt is kind of like saving for retirement and that it’s not always going to be a quick thing, but you just kind of cut it. Just keep at it, you know, just little by little brick by brick. And, know, eventually, you know, you start to see progress and the progress is what keeps you going. It’s like lifting. Like if I, when I get back in the gym and I have my, like I said, like my good streaks,
Once I start to feel a little bit like, okay, my shoulders are getting a little bit back, I got a little shoulder, ⁓ then I’m like, I’m in. I’m ready to go. It’s real life. I reminded myself I can make a dent in this goal that I have. And now I’m more into accomplishing it. It makes it better. it’s just about, as with anything, just the habits, the consistency, and capitalizing on.
seeing your progress.
Connor Agnew (1:00:47)
Yeah, and one other piece I really love that you mentioned was not missing the payments and it makes me laugh because I remember when I destroyed my credit with 100 % revolving utilization and all these things, right? I would look at my credit scorecard and the one thing that I could always hang my hat on was zero missed payments. And I was like, hell yeah, at least I got one thing that’s green, you know, because everything else is dark red. But now it’s obviously changed around a lot. But it was was funny to hear you mention that because I’m like, yeah, that was the one thing that I could say I didn’t do. I never missed a payment.
Mike Campagna (1:01:06)
That’s right.
There you go. mean, consistency is key.
Connor Agnew (1:01:21)
Yep. Well, okay. My last question for you, you’ve got essentially an entire strain and conditioning platform available to you. Is there anything that you feel you left unsaid or any final things that you want to mention before we wrap it up?
Mike Campagna (1:01:37)
I think that we talked about a lot of good stuff. think that ⁓ like a lot of… So when you deal with strength and conditioning, it’s about like, it’s a health and wellness thing, right? There’s also financial wellness and a lot of, you know, I do retirement stuff, but for a lot of these companies, like they’ll have me come in and just talk about financial wellness. And I think if I need to take like the advice of treating my body better,
you know, having better health and wellness and maybe guys like you might just need to treat your financial situation better and, you know, care for it a little more, like nurture it, you know what I mean? The wellness piece of it because it’s all intertwined, right? So ⁓ I think the wellness piece is huge
And when approaching all of this stuff, ⁓ be kind to yourself, know, be kind and be honest. Like we talked about the budgeting piece of it. Be honest and then don’t beat yourself up over it when you see what that breakdown is that you’re really doing. It’s kind of like how you would treat like, you know, an athlete that you’re training. you know, you want to do whatever is going to make them keep going. And so
The same thing with your financial health. A slip up doesn’t mean you just quit and just throw all the habits in the trash. Getting back on the wagon, accepting that you’re going to slip up here and there, but it doesn’t derail the whole direction of everything. A lot of these things that I’m saying, I feel like translate really well with just training and getting healthier. It’s just about habits.
consistency, honesty, ⁓ being kind to yourself, but also challenging yourself. And I think a lot of those principles can kind of take you to where you need to be. And that’s sort of where I would leave it.
Connor Agnew (1:03:40)
No, they’re both forms of discipline. And I think that’s why they relate so well. And exactly like you mentioned earlier, it’s delayed gratification. It’s the exact same thing. Like I won’t notice if I don’t eat ice cream the night before, the next day. But if I make that same decision over and over again, I may notice on the scale, I may notice from a physical standpoint that I look better, I maybe feel better about myself, there’s progress to be made. There’s a delayed gratification aspect to it. So I think there’s a ton of parallels and I think that’s why this episode is so beneficial because
I think there’s a lot of mystification of finances. I think there’s a lot of worry about, know, I don’t know about it or I’m not doing what I need to do. So I’m just going to kind of ignore it. When strength coaches can just understand these careers are so similar and these principles are so much the same that you can make a difference and you can do it quickly just by making some small changes.
Mike Campagna (1:04:32)
Absolutely, absolutely.
Connor Agnew (1:04:34)
Well, Mike, appreciate you greatly, man. Seriously, thank you so much for coming on. Who would have known all those times playing NCAA, we’d be having a conversation on a podcast in 2025. It’s awesome.
Mike Campagna (1:04:45)
It was an absolute honor and I wouldn’t have rather done it with anybody else but you. So this was a blast. My first ever podcast appearance. I hope I didn’t bore everyone and I’m thankful to anyone that is continuing to listen to this.
Connor Agnew (1:05:02)
No, you crushed it, seriously.
okay, well, I just want to give you an opportunity to kind of speak to services you can provide or if anybody has any questions or follow ups, what would be the best way to get in contact with you?
Mike Campagna (1:05:14)
Yeah, so I’m in the business of just trying to be helpful to people. ⁓ So, you know, I don’t necessarily have anything to sell or anything like that. But I will say ⁓ if you’re listening right now, if if you just want somebody to have a conversation with regarding finances, regarding retirement or anything along those lines of that nature, reach out to Connor and he will connect you with me and I’d be happy to chat with you and. ⁓
bounce ideas or whatever we need to talk about and maybe I’ll exchange it for like a workout tip or something like that.
Connor Agnew (1:05:51)
That seems like a pretty fair trade, I like that.
Mike Campagna (1:05:53)
Yeah, I mean, I know I need it, so…
Connor Agnew (1:05:55)
Alright,
well leave it at that. Mike, thank you so much for coming on,
Mike Campagna (1:06:02)
Absolutely, it was great. Thank you.
