I’m John Lanza. I help parents raise money-smart kids and you can see my blog and listen to my podcast here. I created The Money Mammals to help get young kids excited money-smarts. I wrote The Art of Allowance to help parents build on this excitement and craft a plan to raise money-smart kids (from toddlers to teens). I also just launched a live, real-time online course, The Art of Allowance Academy.
I created this online home to write about other topics of interest and share what I like to do. Like that I’m an avid runner, board game enthusiast and reader. I invite you to read — and critique — my one-paragraph summaries of impactful books.
I’m on a mission to help parents raise money-smart kids and I’m also interested in other topics. I’m currently thinking and writing about improving education, teaching online, effective politics and creativity. I expect this list to change often.
You can sign up for my newsletter here. It’s called Memos from the Chief Mammal and in it I share 3 ideas to Share and Save, riffing on the mantra from The Money Mammals theme song. It’s mostly about helping parents raise money-smart kids, although I do plan to share more of the writing from this site in future editions. It’s the easiest way to keep in touch, so I hope you’ll sign up.
I mentioned before that I love to read. That wasn’t always the case. I owe the daily reading habit I developed back in 2015 to my wife, Eileen Lanza, for introducing me to Hal Elrod’s book, Miracle Morning. You can see most of what I’ve read recently on Goodreads. The most important habit I developed was to wake up early (usually 5am) to carve out time to read. I also meditate, typically with Sam Harris’ Waking Up app, and journal in Evernote.
I started in animation on Bebe’s Kids (my first job, as a PA), and I produced the Emmy-winning series, Life With Louie, and The Adventures of Tom Thumb and Thumbelina, among others. My daughters were the inspiration for my wife and I to create The Money Mammals. Our thinking was to use a medium often used to sell kids stuff to instead get them excited about money in ways that didn’t just include spending. My kids do enjoy spending their money and they make mostly smart choices, including saving, investing and sharing it.
I’m the oldest of four brothers and my sister is internet famous.
Thanks for visiting.
— John