It’s not easy being thirty these days.

Late twenties into early midlife is when the people in our lives begin to make deep shifts– some are living with parents and never really left college life, some are heavily focused on career and going out every night, some are overwhelmed by new families, some are starting over, and some have found themselves going to bed early and telling kids to get off their lawns.

It seems like the market is shifting beneath our feet, as though the world we grew up in of bleeping modems and corded telephones, of stable vocations, predictable career paths and pensions, is gone forever. As those older than us start calling it quits and those younger than us get hired as cheaper, faster labor, we have to start asking ourselves:

Are we getting left behind? Can we ever actually catch up? How can we save for retirement, something our parents told us to start doing when we were twenty, when we’re barely getting by now? How can we start a family when we can’t afford to buy a house? How can we make a million dollars when the only way to negotiate a real raise these days is to quit and get a new job?

I am here to tell you there is a better way. After seeing the suffering of those around me and questioning myself and my own struggles, I found the truth:

The world we live in has changed. By putting blinders on and ignoring it, by faithfully using the same tools and following the same paths our parents did, we will never get beyond the treadmill. The game has changed and there are new rules. I am here to find them out, to show you the people who are discovering the new rules and how to use them to your own advantage. The key here is not “keeping up with the Joneses” but to have the Joneses spend all their time speculating on how you can possibly afford to always be in Tahiti anyway. You could tell them, but would they really believe you?

-M & B