What You’ve Done to Create Financial Freedom, Vol. 4

In this episode of Motley Fool Rule Breaker Investing, Motley Fool co-founder David Gardner revisits three favorite moments from the first three years of the podcast’s annual tradition of finding out what you’ve done over the past year to create financial freedom. The path may be simpler than it first appears: Believe. Persist. Pass it on.

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A full transcript is below.

This podcast was recorded on July 1, 2026.

David Gardner: As we welcome another Independence week here in the U.S., freedom is on our minds. For this podcast, of course, financial freedom is on my mind, and I hope yours too. For many of us, especially Motley Fool members and Rule Breaker listeners, those two words, financial freedom, echo like a Liberty Bell. I consider liberty to be one of America's five core values, and it's on display this week when we share and riff on the dream and for some the reality of the liberty that comes from financial freedom. Some great notes from The Fool community to share out this week, let freedom ring. Only on this week's Rule Breaker Investing.

Happy holiday week, especially to my fellow Americans celebrating America's 250th birthday and what an amazing country this is and how fortunate and how blessed I am to have been born into it. For many of you, I hope you feel exactly the same way. I continue to take pride in the immigrants spirit that I see around me first-generation Americans, among most of the great optimists that I know. In a lot of ways, this country is built on constant waves of immigrants my family, my various families all being part of that, as well. I think that's something that I like to underline and celebrate. Some of my best conversations about why to love this country and what makes this country great often happen with people who just got here and share with you where they came from and why they're here now, so shout out to all my first-generation Americans. Also second, third, fourth, fifth, and the list goes on.

Got just a few stories this week. This won't be a long or deep podcast. We had a wonderful mailbag last week. I think there were seven items or so. We had a lot of stories last month. We had a campfire stories podcast during the month, so I feel like I've been hitting you with a lot of stories. Just a few.

I want to start with this first one from Emily because Emily wrote in from Texas and tells a story that I hope gives anybody who's thinking about starting to invest. Just starting, I hope it gives you some sense of hope but also the fun that can come of it. "Hi, David and Tom Motley. I'm a 36-year-old woman. I'm the only person in my life, and that I know in my demographic who invests outside of an employer 401K. That's at least in part, thanks to resources offered by The Motley Fool. Today, I'm a paid subscriber, but I find your free resources especially sparkly. " Emily writes for young people. Maybe you have listeners like me from seven years ago who are looking for a place to begin, or maybe they're like me today, still putting great value in basic education, but now having fun with personal analysis and pick. Either way, thank you for making the world of investing accessible, and dare I say, Emily goes on fun. Please keep up the great work. "You were sincerely making a difference in a world that experiences great disparity. I love to break the rules, and your mission to level the playing field is truly admirable. Here's a fun story." Emily concludes. "I bought my first individual stock in 2020, 2021. I didn't know what I was doing. But if I don't have skin in the game, I don't learn very quickly, and I knew that. The lightheartedness of your podcast made the jump in feel less scary. I did my own research and picked a company with a future I thought I could see and understand. That first pick was Nvidia. I wish I had more to put in the game at the time, it's been a wildly entertaining ride, and I've been investing consistently since when?" Emily concludes. In a nice postscript, she adds, "Working for The Motley Fool, a company aligned with my ethics and passions would be my life's next dream."

I always love hearing that, Emily. I've often said I'm after the good opinion of good people, and for our company we're after the best people who have the most passion for what we can do that we can find. I'm never quite sure, since I'm not directly in operations anymore what jobs we might have on offer, but rest assured, I'm forwarding your note to our hiring department. But I think what I want to underline from Emily's story, obviously, to start with your first stock pick, even to make your first stock pick in a world as Emily points out that she doesn't really know many people who are like her that are doing what she does investing outside their 401K. But to think the first stock you would find is pretty much the great stock of the last six years, a generationally great stock. I'm glad you picked it. I'm glad you thought about where the world is and where it's going and what made sense to you.

That's why I've always considered investing to be a very rational exercise. Rational, which sounds dry and boring, but rational and fun, and it's a devastating 1, 2 punch, and I think you're feeling that, Emily. I love that you're doing it, and I'm really happy for you and your story, and you clearly have made some good gains over the last year toward financial freedom. Thanks for leading off with Item No. 1 this week.

Item No. 2 is a remarkable creation from Matt the Knave. Matt, that's how you signed your name to this body of work. You just signed it Matt the Knave. To Matt the Knave, I want to thank him ahead of time, and for the rest of you, I'm getting to share Matt's Riff off the Declaration of Independence. Yes, that one that started this country in 1776, but Matt has tweaked it, of course, to make it the Rule Breaker Declaration of Financial Independence. It closely mirrors the actual declaration itself, as you'll hear, but it comes from somebody who clearly like Emily loves purchasing individual stocks and feels freedom, feels as if Matt, it feels like you've been freed from the notion that you should only ever invest in mutual funds. You are having fun with this, and I'm going to have fun reading it. Item No. 2, Matt the Knaves Declaration of Financial Independence.

Dear David, thank you for the positive impact your book, your podcast and The Motley Fool have had on myself, and members of my family. I was going to tell a story of my journey to financial independence, but the idea of writing a version of the Declaration of Independence based on the principles of Rule Breaker Investing, that didn't just pop into my head, it spiffy popped. Matt writes into my head, so here you go. "I'm not going to interrupt this to give any of my own commentary." I think Matt this speaks for itself and deserves to be read straight from start to finish. I'm rubbing my hands together. Let's get started. A Rule Breaker Declaration of Financial Independence.

When in the course of economic events? It becomes necessary for investors to dissolve the financial ties which have connected them to mutual funds and to assume among the capital holders of the Earth the equal opportunity to which the laws of supply and demand entitle them, a decent respect to the participants in the free market requires them to declare the causes which impel them to the liquidation. We hold these truths to be self-evident that all publicly traded companies are not created equal, that some are infused by their founders with certain intangible qualities that among these are top dog status, high consumer appeal, and visionary management that to secure the fruits of these great companies, self-directed brokerage accounts are available to the people, driving their legitimacy from Charles R. Schwab that whenever 401K plans become destructive of these goals by limiting choices, it is the right of individual investors to roll over their funds to brokerage accounts, laying a foundation for stock purchases on such principles as sustainable competitive advantage. Strong past price appreciation and perceived overvaluation to render them and their progeny smarter, happier, and richer over time. Prudence will dictate that funds long established should not be transferred for minor or passing causes.

But when a long train of underperformance demonstrates a design to reduce such funds to an absolute pittance relative to market returns, it is their right, it is their duty to cast off such mismanagement and provide a new path to future prosperity. The history of the present reign of mutual funds is a history of subpar investments and lagging returns, all having the effect of establishing an absolute tyranny over the individual investor. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world. They have imposed front-end and back-end load charges. They have set excessive fees that erode the power of compounded shareholder returns. They have forsaken the proven winning strategy of buy-and-hold for the long term in favor of trading stocks like grade-school boys swapping baseball cards at recess. They have incurred expensive and unnecessary short-term capital gains taxes. Through their impatience, they have cobbled together a dog's breakfast of the best to the worst stocks on the market, curbing the power of lead huskies by tethering them to teams of hobbled, mangy hounds.

We, therefore, the representatives of the Rule Breaker Republic, as Motley Fools assembled, appealing to the invisible hand of the market, do solemnly publish and declare that we are and of right ought to be free and independent investors with full power to become owners and wear the jerseys of publicly traded companies of our own choosing by purchasing shares of stock, choose top dogs and first movers in important emerging industries as the north star of our investing approach. Buy and hold for a minimum of 3-5 years, add up rather than doubling down. Let our biggest winners run high until they spiffy-pop so many times we stop counting. Establish sleep numbers, mitigate risk by investing in a number of companies equal to our age in accordance with the Gardner-Kretzmann Continuum, and do all other acts and things which free and independent people have a right to do with their money, with the exception, buying dips to make themselves and the world a smarter, happier, and more prosperous place. For the support of this declaration, with a firm faith in the invisible hand that guides the market up and to the right, we Foolishly pledge to each other our lives, our honor, and our Roth IRA balances.

Fool on, best regards. Matt the Knave. I said I wouldn't comment during and I didn't I will just leave a brief postscript before moving on to item Number 3 to say, Matt, that was absolutely fantastic. Thank you for taking the time, for putting the time in to make that so very good. All of the Rule Breaker flourishes show me how well you know what we're about here, and I hope and trust and indeed, you did say at the start of your note that you were going to tell the story of your journey to financial independence, but you decide to do this instead. But I'm so glad to know my book, this podcast and our company have been so helpful for you and for members of your family. Think of it this way, Matt. You just paid us back. That was an absolutely fantastic piece, which I look forward to sharing again in future. Fool on. Matt the Knave.

When I think about financial freedom, one of the first people that comes to mind is the executive director of our Fool Community Foundation. When we started the foundation several years ago, the way that I began to talk about it is that we have a lot of people listening to me right now who have some measure of financial freedom, in some cases have entire financial freedom. The Motley Fool has done a great job over now four decades, reaching people and helping, I hope you make better investment decisions to make the world smarter, happier, and richer. One third of Americans and others around the world are financially healthy people, but that leaves a big middle bucket of people those who are living paycheck to paycheck. What George and I have been dreaming of is the idea that we would have a campfire not just with great stories of people who bought Nvidia or Netflix, but great stories of people who saved their very first true dollar and invested it and got started. That's something when I think about what I've done to help create some financial freedom, helping start the foundation is top of my list. With that said, here comes our executive director George Khalaf. George, welcome back to Rule Breaker Investing.

George Khalaf: Thank you, David. Pleasure to be here.

David Gardner: Let's start with just a personal reflection, George. I've asked our fellow Fools this week what you have done to create financial freedom or a little bit more of it in the year that has been. What comes to mind for you, George?

George Khalaf: As I've gotten older, I've come to realize that financial freedom isn't ultimately about money. It's about options, and it's about the ability to spend your time in ways that align with your values and bring you joy. When I think about it in my life, I've found that buying more stuff really creates the lasting happiness that I'm looking for. In fact, it often creates the opposite, more things to organize, maintain, worry about, and insure. My family is squeezed into an 1,100-square-foot apartment in New York City, so we can't have more stuff. Increasingly, I've tried to spend money on services and experiences that free up the time and reduce the stress. When you buy back a little time, you can reinvest in your family, in your friends, in your health, and your community. That David's become one of my personal definitions of financial freedom, having the ability to direct your time towards the people and the activities that matter most.

David Gardner: More options, less stuff. I like it, George.

George Khalaf: Yes.

David Gardner: You and I just spent time, I think it was a week ago. We were on the platform helping close the NASDAQ together as our compatriots at Motley Fool Asset Management rang the closing bell. It was great to see you there. Had you been to the NASDAQ's market site before?

George Khalaf: That was my first time, and it was very memorable. It was great. It was a very rainy day, and it was impressive seeing all the people outside in Times Square looking in. It happened to be during the World Cup, so they were all wearing their Argentina shirts in Brazil. It was wonderful.

David Gardner: You looked great in an orange Fool cap, but anybody who's either on LinkedIn and wants to search George Khalaf, our Fool Community Foundation, or if you're following us on Twitter X, you can find Fool Community Foundation there. You'll get to see a picture of George with an orange Jester cap on. George, let's briefly focus outside. Let's go bigger than just you and me right now. Let me ask you, what is The Fool Community Foundation doing? What has it been setting up over the last year to create more financial freedom?

George Khalaf: There are two signature programs, David, with The Fool Community Foundation. One is investing in nonprofit organizations that are advancing our mission to help Americans living paycheck to paycheck. That's the Impact Full fund, Foolishly named the IF fund. That's recognizing that there are already people and organizations doing this work, and we want to support them and amplify the work they're doing and accelerate it with a financial award, technical support, mentorship and everything else to help them grow further and faster. But we also recognize that we want to work further upstream and help the next generation avoid some of the problems that we're seeing today in Americans living paycheck to paycheck. We're launching the Freedometer, which is a tool that will be introduced in high schools reaching up to 5 million students starting this fall to teach them in a Foolish F way the power of investing.

David Gardner: That is fantastic, and of the two programs, I love them both. They're all our children. But in particular, I think the freedometer because of its debut coming up for the first time this coming school year, reaching through our partner Next Gen Personal Finance, reaching millions of high school students and really starting to teach them more about the stock market than they probably have understood before, something that for me has been so integral to my own financial freedom and spreading it to so many people hearing us right now, so that's really exciting. I want to thank you, George, for your leadership there. Of course, to Sean Milliken and Clam Laurence, who are running the IF fund. It is Foolishly named because it's the ImpactFool, but it's Impact Fool Fund. But if you just pick up the acronym, you hear if, and so we start saying, what if? We're so excited about those things.

George Khalaf: What's interesting is that when you teach young people to invest, you're not just teaching them about stocks. It changes how they think about money so saving suddenly has a purpose. Budgeting becomes a tool rather than a chore. They start asking, how do I get my money working for me? I've seen it with my own kids who have been guinea pigs with the freedometer. Where instead of starting by teaching about budgeting and saving, we're starting about the power of investing and compounding. When you start that way, when you get to the more boring stuff around savings and budgeting, there's a purpose behind it, and they're more excited to budget and save because they realize the potential that represents down the road.

David Gardner: George, I want to thank you for your leadership for The Fool Community Foundation. I also want to mention that we have a little site that anyone listening to us if you want to learn a little bit more about our work, of course, there's foolfoundation.org, but there's now foolfoundation.org/rbi, speaking directly to listeners of this podcast. That's a page that anybody can engage with and I would highly recommend if you find yourself interested and you want to cast your lot with us, join us aboard the ship of Fools, foolfoundation.org, and if you like slash RBI George, great ways to find out more about what you and I are working on. I want to thank George Khalaf for this cameo appearance on What you've done to create financial freedom for the 2026 edition, George, I can't wait to hear what we're going to talk about one year from this week. It'll be really exciting to review together the gains that we have made. George Khalaf, thank you for joining us during Financial Freedom Week for Rule Breaker Investing. As a fellow American, I also want to say happy 250th to you, sir.

George Khalaf: Thank you, David. It's always a pleasure to be here. Fool on.

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David Gardner: Thanks again to George Khalaf. In fact, just as George steps away from the microphone, he's going to be with a Motley Fool member. They're going on a boat in the Hudson River together, and I trust they'll talk about freedom a little bit, probably some financial freedom, as well so sail on, George.

Let's move on to items Number 4, 5, and 6. For these, I decided I wanted to go back to the last few years of this series. This is Volume 4 of what you've done to create financial freedom. We've just had some great points that were made in the last few years. Volumes 1, 2, and three. I decided, let me pull a treasured point from each of the last three years to provide a little bit of a blast from the past, tie it all together here to close out Volume 4. Indeed, the points I'm pulling tell their own story because there's a sequence here.

There's a trilogy of points, and I'll just give them to you ahead of time. The first one I'm calling believe because I think that's where you need to start believing that you can become financially free one day. Then the second point is persist because through good markets and bad, you need to keep saving you need to keep investing so believe and then persist. Then our final point to close this week will be pass it on. Again, each of these is a story told before on this episodic series, what you've done to financial freedom.

The first one is from 2023 Volume 1, and starting the journey is what many Rule Breaker Investing listeners, many Fool members over the years have done. That's really something that we're here for. I hope that the Motley Fool continues to be a leader in getting people started, increasing numbers of people, not just in the United States, but around the world and getting them started toward what I would call investing. If you've read my book or listen to this podcast, you know that's a deep and beautiful word. It's not a word synonymous with trading. It's actually the opposite of that, but truly investing. I hope that we serve as a touchstone for you, for those around you, for many people who come after to get started investing.

That was true of Ken Taylor, who wrote in to this series in 2023, who tweeted what I'm about to share with you back at me. I had just asked the question on Twitter in 2023. What have you done to contribute to financial freedom? In the past year, and Ken wrote. I began my investing journey. I started saving and investing at a very high rate. He went on, I'm late to the game and hoping to catch up. The greatest thing about it is it set me on a new career path. Ken continued, when I reach financial freedom, I will be able to choose to work doing what I love or not to work at all. Either way, it will include a confidence in being able to travel for as long as I physically can without risking my ability to cover my finances indefinitely. In conclusion, Ken wrote about financial freedom. I'm a long way from that day. But I can actually imagine it now. Whereas, 15 months ago, I thought I'd never be able to retire. That's what he wrote and I really appreciated that, Ken. I think what brings a smile to my face, most of all, is that now in 2026, four years ago, you didn't see any light at the end of that tunnel. Then, with your note, you did and today, I bet today, financial freedom feels even a little bit closer. You can actually, in your own words I emphasize this word from what you wrote. You can imagine it. Now, you know you're still away from it, but wow, I hope doesn't pull us forward, and having that hope for many people is what gets us from Point A, which is usually your starting point, a place of less, a place that's harder. You're just starting two to point B, a place that's easier, a point of more. Thank you again for sharing that, Ken. We wish you the very best. I hope this podcast, I hope The Motley Fool. I hope The Fool Community Foundation can be helpful in your journey.

By the way, he didn't go into this at more length. It was just a tweet. Ken was tweeting, but he did say the greatest thing about it is it set him on a new career path. A lot of times there are second-order positive effects of starting to truly invest toward your financial freedom. Once we decide we put a stake in the ground, you draw that line in the sand in front of you, you say, I am now officially committing to working toward my financial freedom. A lot of second-order effects start to show up. I love that it involved a career change for you, Ken. For a lot of people, a good encouragement. I've seen the positive win-win dynamics of this take hold. When they finally decide to invest, maybe they buy a bunch of stocks. I like 20 to start with, as I've certainly pointed out to many Rule Breakers in the past, I write about that in my book, Rule Breaker Investing. But whether you want to start with funds or stocks, however many you choose, in general, if you're doing it right, those will go up over time, and that creates a new positive reinforcement cycle because you're like, Honey, let's save even more together. Because look what happens when we invest that money, that money starts making its own money. That inspires so many of us to start to want to save even more, and so it's that positive loop, that dynamic of the more you invest, the better you do. The more you want to save, the more you invest, rinse and repeat. Ken, I know you've been feeling that. That was Item Number 4, as I said, Chapter 1 of our little mini booklet here that I was entitling Believe.

Here comes Item Number 5. The second chapter in our trilogy. This one comes from two years ago, what you've done to create financial freedom, Volume 2. The year was 2024 and a big part of the American spirit, since that's on my mind this week, maybe yours, too, I would say it's that spirit of self-reliance, which puts me in mind of Ralph Waldo Emerson's famous essay entitled Self-Reliance. I wanted to speak briefly to this because I did this two years ago, so I'm echoing myself here with this item. I think you'll understand why in a sex. Here's a very well-known quote from Emerson's essay, Self-Reliance, and I quote, small f, of course, here, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.” I want to speak out both sides of my mouth briefly to that because, taking Emerson, first of all, and his main word, a small f, foolish consistency, the hobgoblin of little minds, taking that straight up for the point he's trying to make, I think we can all agree with him, can't we? If you're just going through the motions, then with your little mind as a little statesman, you're probably not going to do anything great. In this life, you may well never reach the freedom that we all hope for if you're just going through the motions of what got you here. Unless, of course, what got you here is totally working, by the way.

But again, for a lot of us, we realize no, we actually do have to push our boundaries out a little bit more. We need to save. A little bit more. Be more frugal. We need to take a little bit more risk. Be willing to sit through market downdrafts in order to get the great winds that come from people who truly invest, who truly buy to hold over long periods of time. That's really the way toward riches. It's not that small f, foolish consistency that's going to get us there. We have to stretch ourselves a little bit. But now speaking briefly out the other side of our mouth at The Motley Fool, we've had a lot of fun over the years, taking quotes that mention fools and foolishness and reversing their meaning by capitalizing the word foolish so read differently that Emerson Line, a capital F, Foolish consistency is something that I want to celebrate because it's not the hobgoblin of little minds. It's actually what gets you and me to financial freedom. Here's what a capital F, Foolish consistency looks like to me. It looks like you saving money. Every two weeks, a little bit, and then maybe a little bit more than that over time from your salary check in order to invest that probably through dollar cost averaging mechanically and regularly in every good and every bad market that you will face, and you'll see both into your future. You're showing, again, a capital F, Foolish consistency of saving and investing. If that's a hobgoblin, well, let me just say that's not a hobgoblin. That's actually the way to financial freedom. That is point No. 2 here, Chapter 2. That is persist. I said the first book from Ken Taylor's about Believe and the second Emersonian reflection is persist.

Then the third reminds me of a fantastic note we featured last year on Volume 3. What you've done to create financial freedom. In 2025, one of my favorite Fools Jason Newman, who's made numerous appearances on mailbags and other such sundry features offered by this podcast over the years. But I first met Jason at a Motley Fool book signing in the 1990s in New York City. He's been one of my favorite Fools ever since. Jason started his note last year this way, he wrote, "True financial independence is when your kids start to see the light and begin to live out the capital F, Foolish rule Breakery principles themselves." Jason went on, That's exactly what I'm witnessing this spring because last spring, he had two graduates in the house, one from high school, one from college. Jason wrote, I'm filled with pride. My oldest now shares takeaways from the Rule Breaker Investing podcast with me regularly. That's right. Brady Newman, his dad writes, "You're well on your way to financial independence, and you might not even realize it yet, time is your friend, my son, Fool on", and then to his other son, Jason wrote Gabe. "While you've shown sparks of interest with college still ahead of you, it's more than OK if your focus is elsewhere. For now, it's never too late to start in earnest, and we'll keep the light on for you." I love those lines, Jason, especially the one that let it all off. I'm going to say it again, true financial independence.

Are you hearing this, Fools? Do you get a parent's true financial independence? Is when your kids start to see the light beginning to live out these Foolish Rule-Breakery principles themselves. What a beautifully other-minded statement of responsibility, care, and commitment coming from a father, that he doesn't really think we're financially independent until we see our kids living that out, if we've done our job well, parents, and by the way, it can start today. It doesn't have to be that you were doing this when your daughter was 13 or when your son was three. It can start with them as adults, but true financial independence. Underlying this is when your kids start to see the light on their own. Thank you, this special week, to Emily, to Matt the Knave, to George, to Ken, and Jason, and to you.

Dear listener, I hope you feel like you've made positive progress over the past year toward financial freedom. But even more, I hope you will bring in the year ahead, energy, optimism, and real persistent plans to do what you do toward financial freedom of that of others that you love around you, again, in this year ahead. Happy Fourth to my fellow Americans and to all others, a grand week. It is a grand day. Financial Freedom Day. Fool on.

Charles Schwab is an advertising partner of Motley Fool Money. David Gardner has positions in Netflix. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Netflix and Nvidia. The Motley Fool recommends Charles Schwab and recommends the following options: short September 2026 $95 calls on Charles Schwab. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.