A quiet morning walk with a dog can often dredge up unexpected echoes from the past. For J.D. Roth, founder of the long-running personal finance site Get Rich Slowly, a recent stroll brought back a vivid memory from 1992, shortly after he graduated from college and began working for his father at a rural box factory.
Back then, a traveling salesman—someone who trained other salespeople—had somehow tracked down the remote business headquarters. The office was located in a dilapidated trailer house, the very same one Roth had grown up in, which he describes as a true pit. Amused by the visitor, Roth’s father introduced the young graduate to the man with the permanent grin, suggesting they talk shop.
Seated in the back room of the worn-out trailer, the salesman delivered his pitch: "How would you like to make more money?"
At the time, Roth was earning a meager $16,500 a year with no commissions—roughly equivalent to $35,500 in 2022 dollars—despite the apparent nepotism of his hiring. Naturally, he replied that he would love to make more. But what stuck with Roth through the decades wasn’t the pitch itself, but the salesman’s unwavering, perpetual smile, a look that remained plastered across his face even when he wasn’t speaking.
After ten minutes of leading questions designed to secure agreement, the salesman deployed his presumptive close: "When can I schedule you for training?"
Roth sighed and declined. Before the man could pivot to his rehearsed rebuttals, Roth offered an honest explanation that stunned both the salesman and his father later on. "I’m not like most salesmen. I’m not ambitious," Roth told him. While he acknowledged he wanted to make more money, he had zero desire to become a corporate titan or the "King of Sales."
His father, whom Roth describes as the most ambitious person he had ever known, was completely baffled. Growing up, Roth had never been driven by ambition. Whether in grade school, high school, or college, his academic success, editing stints for literary magazines, and national competitions in the Future Business Leaders of America were never driven by a hunger for status or achievement. Instead, they stemmed from pure intellectual curiosity, passion, and intrinsic motivation. He achieved because he loved what he was doing, not because he was chasing a milestone.
Allergic to Making Money
That fundamental disconnect between Roth’s worldview and the relentless drive of the modern business world came into sharp focus months ago during a trip to Orlando for Fincon, the annual conference for financial bloggers, YouTubers, podcasters, and digital influencers.
During a morning brainstorming session at an empty conference room table, a group of successful personal finance creators gathered to discuss their latest ventures. These were talented professionals who were not only doing good work in financial literacy, but also making substantial sums of money doing it. Surrounded by peers who were continually strategizing on how to capture more readers, amass more viewers, and secure higher publicity and revenue, Roth felt distinctly out of place.
When the conversation shifted to the status of Get Rich Slowly, Roth shared his vision of transforming the platform into a reliable "online encyclopedia of personal finance"—an unvarnished, trustworthy destination free from corporate noise. He also casually mentioned that the site was currently generating modest earnings of about $500 per month.
The disclosure prompted a blunt reaction from a colleague: "I don’t get you, J.D. Why are you allergic to making money?"
Roth’s response was rooted in his upbringing. Coming from a poor family and raised in a rundown trailer home, he viewed his current life as an unimaginable abundance. "I don’t possess the same ambition that you do. I don’t need to be rich. I don’t need to be famous," he told them.
Reflecting on the broader picture, Roth contends that a vast portion of modern societal problems stems not necessarily from outright malice or greed, but from unbridled ambition—a form of self-absorption characterized by a lack of empathy and a willful blindness to the collateral damage inflicted on those who are less fortunate.
For instance, Roth notes that he could easily command significant revenue by promoting credit cards on Get Rich Slowly. However, having personally endured years of painful credit card debt, he refuses to lead others down the same treacherous path. While he acknowledges that credit cards are neutral financial tools when managed responsibly and that it is not his individual duty to protect the entire world from debt, the prospect of promoting products that could ruin lives feels uncomfortably akin to offering whiskey to an alcoholic.
Similarly, he refuses to chase viral trends, write about fleeting topics simply because they are trending, or cover every new app and service that enters the market just to capture algorithmic attention. While such tactics are standard operating procedure for many digital publishers, Roth admits that implementing them makes him feel as though he is compromising his core values.
Unclouded by Ambition
Conferences like Fincon are undeniably electric. Surrounded by creators who are dominating their niches and reaching millions of people or earning millions of dollars annually, it is easy to feel energized. In the past, Roth would return home eager to implement growth strategies, maximize traffic, and optimize revenue metrics. As someone naturally competitive, those measurable metrics held a powerful appeal.
Yet, returning from the most recent conference brought a different kind of clarity. Rather than motivating him to scale up, the experience solidified his resolve to exit the traditional publishing game entirely. He no longer cares about running the largest platform, maximizing web traffic, or funneling human attention into dollar signs. Recognizing that he dislikes being subjected to those aggressive marketing funnels himself, he sees no reason to inflict them on his audience.
Furthermore, the personal experiences of recent years have deeply shifted his perspective. Roth has become increasingly convinced that he wants to streamline his digital footprint, focusing strictly on storytelling and helping others, and doing so completely unclouded by the pressures of ambition.
While he admits that his competitive streak can occasionally tempt him to chase engagement metrics and revenue targets, he views those numbers as a dangerous trap that distracts from what truly matters. True fulfillment, in his view, requires casting aside the conventional playbook of modern content creation and forging an entirely independent path.
This Is the Way
Where this unmapped path leads remains entirely uncertain. It is entirely possible that Roth will spend the coming decade creating content for a small audience of dozens while continuing to pull in a meager $500 a month—or potentially earning nothing at all for extended periods. In fact, his immediate intention involves stripping all advertising from the website.
Yet, that uncertainty does not deter him. By abandoning the well-traveled highway of modern digital publishing, he is choosing to follow a trail of his own making, free from the crushing pressure to manufacture clicks and maximize engagement. While exploring this new route will inevitably involve wrong turns and dead ends, he views those detours as valuable parts of the journey rather than wasted time.
Officially, Roth remains on sabbatical. Even so, he continues to publish occasional reflections, including upcoming pieces inspired by the exercises in the book Designing Your Life and personal thoughts following the recent death of his mother.
As he steps forward into this next chapter, Roth extends an open invitation to his readers to join him on the journey into uncharted territory, confident that the adventure will be far more rewarding with good company along for the ride.
