Highlights and Behind the Scenes Stories from WCICON25 (Where Babies Learned and Loans Were Forgiven)

The giant stage and video screens in San Antonio have been disassembled, all the WCI merch has been placed on pallets and shipped back to Salt Lake City, and everything else from the Physician Wellness and Financial Literacy Conference (WCICON25) has been returned to storage until 2026. But we still feel electrified from our time together in Texas, so let’s reminisce about our favorite moments and highlights from this year’s conference, the sixth one The White Coat Investor has put on in person (and the seventh overall).

It was my fourth time attending WCICON, and yet again, it was enormously meaningful to be around so many smart and motivated people who inspire us to live our rich lives. The keynotes from Dr. Jim Dahle, Dr. Jordan Grumet, and Sarah Catherine Gutierrez were memorable and touching. And the camaraderie among the attendees and the positive vibes left us hungering for next year’s conference.

For the first time I can remember, I saw multiple babies being ferried around the sessions. One adorable 7-month-old spent some of her time lying on her back just outside the backstage/green room area, and as I’m writing this now, I can hear her cooing and grunting as she examines whatever object her parents placed in her hands. As the father and I told each other during a coffee break, getting your kids financially literate when they’re young is so very important.

If you haven’t been before (or if you’ve only attended virtually), make plans to come in person on March 25-28, 2026, when we return to Las Vegas at the JW Marriott Las Vegas Resort & Spa. I made a bunch of new friends at WCICON25, rekindled a bunch of other relationships from previous conferences, gave plenty of handshakes and hugs, and had a blast overall. Like usual, just about everybody seemed really happy to be at WCICON.

My Favorite Moments from WCICON25

Here were some of my favorite scenes from the week.

The Lessons Learned from Financial Independence

Dr. Jim Dahle gave one of his best keynotes during the opening session in the big ballroom when he discussed the lessons he's learned from early financial independence (considering 48% of WCICON25 attendees weren’t yet millionaires and only 17% considered themselves financially independent, this was an important subject). It wasn’t so much about him and Katie Dahle getting to financial independence. It’s what they learned once they got there.

First, he apologized in advance if anything he was to say seemed like humblebragging, because there wasn’t any way to give his talk without talking about their success and their high net worth numbers.

In 2004, Katie had retired from teaching with a new baby, and Jim had finished his PGY1 year. He read Mutual Funds for Dummies, and he realized his financial advisor was ripping off him and his family. He was making $38,000 a year, and he had $6,795 in his Roth IRA and $540 in whole life insurance cash value. He had $6,902 worth of debt. He owed the military four years of work. Their net worth was $432.

They had a written financial plan, and they had their goals. They wanted their investments to provide a $100,000 income by the time he turns 55 in 2030. They wanted to be worth $1 million by 2017 and $2.5 million ($4.3 million in today’s dollars) by 2030.

After living like a resident for four years in the military and making a salary in the $225,000 range, Jim and Katie became millionaires in 2014. A couple of years later, WCI was making an income similar to his physician income. They bought a dining room table and a boat.

Then, life accelerated.

They paid off their mortgage in 2017, and by the end of that year, their net worth was $3.5 million. Not counting taxes or charity, they were spending $150,000 per year. WCI put on its first conference in Park City in 2018, and soon after, Jim and Katie were financially independent with a net worth of $5 million (not counting WCI). They were spending $200,000 a year.

By then, they were in their early 40s with four kids, and they could have FIRE’d if they wanted.

In his keynote, Jim gave 20 lessons he learned on his path to early FI. I’ll only review only a few of them. If you attended WCICON25 and missed his keynote, you can watch it on the WCI Events app. If you weren’t there, you’ll have to wait for the Continuing Financial Education 2025 course when it comes out on April 1.

Lesson #1 You Probably Won’t Stop Working

One reason it’s difficult to retire in your 40s? It’s not socially acceptable to do so. “People,” Jim said, “call that unemployed.” If you finish your W2 career, you could become a ski instructor or a blogger/podcaster or a river rafting guide on a part-time basis. You could even do locums.

Lesson #2 The Worst-Case Scenario Probably Isn’t Going to Happen

For all the time we talk about the 4% rule and the Sequence of Returns Risk and the best ways to begin decumulating your portfolio, you almost certainly won’t run out of money in retirement. On average, if you’re taking 4% out of your portfolio each year, you’re still going to retire with 2.7x the amount you started with after 30 years.

Just look at his parents. As Jim said, “They have more now than they know what to do with.”

Lesson #3 Time Becomes a Limited Asset

Money, time, health, and motivation are all a limited asset. As you approach FI, money is no longer the most important aspect of that foursome. Take a look at one of Jim’s favorite graphs—called Rich, Broke, or Dead—that shows that most people die before they go broke (the green parts are how much money they have, the red part is going broke, and the gray part is being dead).

Time, then, is what becomes the finite resource. That’s why you should find ways to buy your time, work less, and outsource your home chores (I talked to a few people at WCICON about this very topic, and I’ll have an upcoming column on why outsourcing is so mentally uneasy for me).

Lesson #4 You Can Build Your Ideal Life

In 2016, Jim wrote down the following goals. The black writing is the goal. The orange writing is where he stands now.

As you can see, he’s made massive progress, and he encouraged attendees to try the same exercise, being as specific as possible.

“You won’t get there immediately, but take small steps toward it every year,” he said. “This will reduce burnout and increase satisfaction, even before FI.”

Make sure to check out the rest of his keynote. It’s well worth your time.

A Wrangler of Monkeys

During the conference’s check-in process, which was in an outside courtyard at the Hyatt Regency Hill Country Resort and Spa on a sunny 80-degree afternoon, some of my favorite moments occurred when registrants decided what to put for the “title” spot on their WCICON badges.

Most people’s badges looked like this . . .

MICHAEL
Burkett
Psychiatrist

. . . with psychiatrist being the title they chose. Next year, we might just name it “specialty” instead of “title.”

Some got a little more creative with the title. My four favorite titles:

Wrangler of Monkeys: I assume this one came from a spouse who was stuck watching young kids at the conference while their partner was inside the air-conditioned ballroom learning about how to cash flow any income, the power of CBT, and how to choose which index fund you want in your portfolio. This title became an inside joke for the WCI staff for the rest of the conference. Tooth Hero: This, of course, came from a cheeky dentist. CINCDAD: This attendee proclaimed himself as the Commander In Chief for the children he’s raising. Domestic CEO: This one doesn’t need an explanation.

For WCICON26, I might go with this:

JOSH
Katzowitz
Tesla owner/Jim’s nemesis

An Interesting Parable About Football, Flower Beds, and Passion

During the keynote presentation from Dr. Jordan Grumet on What the Dying Can Teach Us About Money and Life, he told an interesting tale about how financial behavior can ruin something we love.

There was once an old man whose passion was his lawn and his flower bed. Some local kids, though, began playing football on his property, trampling all over his flowers and tearing up his grass. No matter how much he pleaded and begged, the old man couldn’t get the kids to stop playing football on his lawn. They loved the game too much.

But the old man knew financial psychology and behavior, and he came up with a plan.

He told the kids that their playing football helped his lawn flourish, and he would pay them $10 a week to play as much football as they could on his grass and his flowers. The kids thought this was a great deal, and they played tons of football that week. After the first week, their hearts were full and their pockets were filled with all the candy that $10 could buy.

But the old man adjusted the deal in the second week. He said, “Hey, you guys aren’t doing as good of a job on my lawn as I thought you would. Listen, you playing football is still helping my lawn. You can still play as much football as possible, but now I’m only going to pay you $5 a week.” The kids were a little miffed, but they still loved playing football. After the second week, their hearts were full (though maybe a little less than the week before), and their pockets weren’t as full of candy.

After the third week, the old man put the exclamation point on the deal. He told the kids they were doing a horrible job helping his lawn. They could keep playing football, but he wouldn’t pay them another cent to use his lawn. The kids huffed and puffed and said they would never play football there again. And they never came back. We assume his lawn and flower beds (and the old man’s mental state) flourished.

Grumet’s conclusion: When we get monetarily rewarded for our passion, sometimes it kills our motivation to do it.

This was only a small part of Jordan’s presentation, and it was a fun little aside. You owe it to yourself to check out the rest of his keynote.

Jim’s Daily Physical Therapy

Every night at about 9pm at WCICON, the WCI staff gathered in one of the hotel’s suites to debrief about the day that was and to talk about the day that’s to come. Normally, people eat popcorn and chocolate cookies while the next day’s assignments are divvied out (who’s scanning credentials at which ballroom, who’s at the registration desk in the morning and the afternoon, who’s introducing the presentations, etc.).

As Jim continues his thrice-a-day physical therapy schedule, thanks to his falling off the Grand Teton last August, he was focused on something else during these meetings—mostly his left wrist. While we discussed feedback from the previous day, Jim was completing exercises involving dumbbells, mallets, some sort of squishy rope looking thing that could be rotated, and a dough cutter and something that looked like silly putty.

Here's what the latter exercise looked like (and the PT tools he's been using).

Seven months after his fall, Jim is still spending plenty of time and much of his daily motivation doing his physical therapy, but even he has limits. At one point I offered to stretch him out like his therapist, but sadly, he declined.

You Guys Like April Fool’s Day Posts?!?

During the WCI columnist panel, where we welcomed two of our newest panelists Dr. Adam Safdi (Rhymes with “crafty”) and Dr. Genhee So (as in “I Dream of …”), we asked the audience whether WCI should continue with our annual April Fool’s Day post, especially after the controversial blowback from last year’s joke about PSLF.

Here’s what the audience said.

Though I don’t believe that so few people are fooled, I find those results awfully interesting.

Fathers and Sons

I met a dad who brought his 17-year-old kid to the conference for some father-son bonding and so they could both learn more about finance together. The best news: his son is a part-time employee of the father so he could pay for both registration fees and use it as a business expense.

Here was another father-son duo, one of whom wrote this poem after the opening reception was complete and posted it on the WCI Events app’s social feed.

A Monumental Step

One of the largest rounds of applause on the final day of the conference was for Dr. Dulce Heelan and Joey Mysliwiec, who paid off the final $27,329 of their student loans just as the conference started. Last year, they had $91,329 left to pay, and after attending WCICON24 in Orlando, they made the goal to complete their payments before WCICON25.

After starting with $478,505 of student loan debt, the two are officially done paying their debts.

Jim announced it from the stage before the final keynote of the conference, and the crowd gave them a warm round of applause for their efforts, leaving Heelan in tears and Mysliwiec with a big grin on his face.

Later, I asked Mysliwiec how they had celebrated that final payment.

“We,” he said, “ordered the appetizer.”

What were your favorite moments from WCICON25? Are you considering attending WCICON26 in Las Vegas?

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