Letter from a Lottery Winner.

Statistics bear out that many Lottery winners wind up broke.  Sometimes worse off than before winning!?!

But often you’ll hear the Poverty Mentality slip out in articles, books and comments like this,

That person is lucky.  They won life’s lottery.

Granted, having a solid upbringing, solid education and parents who give a damn helps a person become successful in life.  But to say a person is successful in life solely based on their upbringing is to say that they won Life’s Lottery.

Well, if winning the real Lottery doesn’t make you Choose Wealthy, then how can winning Life’s Lottery do so?

Potential answers:

1.)  Your parents taught you the value of hard (self-discipline, time management) and smart (pay yourself first, limit debt).

2.)  Your friends grew up to be well-connected and influential and that helped you become more successful.

There is a mindset out there that accepts these two answers as 100% accurate and a fair reflection on winning Life’s Lottery.

But there is more, isn’t there.

If my parents taught me something that I refused to accept or failed to act on based on my personal beliefs, their lessons are moot.

If my friends won’t associate with me because I’m dishonest, lack integrity or have low moral character in some regard, their connections are also, moot.

I must choose, or have chosen, to accept the Wealthy Mentality.  I must educate myself, and by default others through example, on the following precepts:

1.)  My mindset is a choice.

2.)  The mindset taught to me can be accepted or rejected as my mind matures into adulthood.

3.)  Being self-made means exactly that.  I take the materials offered to me by Life, God or the Universe and positively mold myself to benefit from those materials. Self-Made is another way of saying, Self-Molded.

Winning a lottery of any sort is a matter of chance.  An occurrence with a determined probability like 1:1,000,000,000 or the odds of being born to Upper Middle-Class parents who value education and value investing.

But you control your mindset and thereby control the outcome of winning such a Lottery.

The Poverty Mentality blames a personal condition on the public appearance of others.

“Of course I don’t own a home like so-n-so.  My daddy didn’t leave me any land!”

The Wealth Mentality blames no one.  Not God, not self, not others.  It is what it is.

“I don’t own a home but I’m taking steps A, B and C and when I hit D, I’ll have enough cash for the one-payment plan!”

Compared to the other living creatures on this planet, YOU and I DID win a lottery.

We have the ability to Reason, to Think and to Assess ourselves objectively.

We have the ability to choose our Thoughts, Feelings, Actions and thereby, our Results.

Quit waiting for some other Lottery to bail you out.  You’ve already won all you need…

Choose Wealthy my friends.

Quick note v.1

 

I was driving today perusing YouTube for videos about personal finance/business etc.  There is always something new to learn out there.  New concepts being tested, old ones being discarded.  Choosing wealthy is a lifelong process.  It can not be mastered in 4 years of college or by reading one book.  Or one blog, for that matter.

 

So I clicked on a video about Passive Income.  Actually, it was about Multiple Streams of Income.  I noticed something odd in the video so I clicked on another.  Then another.  Then another.

There it was just as plain as day.  The poverty mentality.

 

Yep, dozens of well-meaning videos about creating Multiple Streams of Income (can anything say “Wealthy Person” more than that phrase?) and there was the poverty mentality.

I’ll give you some quotes,

“Just become an affiliate of some company and the money will start rolling in.”

“Rental properties are an easy way to passive wealth.”

My favorite,

“You can make thousands, no!, Millions with Amazon drop shipping…”

Broke-ass thought process all over the place.  No wonder How-To-Get-Rich never works as well as the How-To people promise.

Becoming an affiliate and waiting for wealth is the same as becoming an employee and waiting for a check.  Does it make sense to become an affiliate?  Yes.  Multiple Streams of Income DO create wealth, depending on the stream.  Are you getting wealthy off .25 of commission for a sales velocity of twice a week?  No.  But it is a good premise.

Rental properties are not easy until you have experience, rock-solid leases and even more rock-solid tenants.  Until then, it’s a learning curve that makes Sofia Vergara look like a stick figure.

Yes, drop shipping with Amazon works well and has worked for countless people.  But Millions?  For the average Joe?

The Poverty Mentality believes firmly there is some magical formula out there.  Hear that…

OUT THERE!

 

I don’t care much for magic beans, Santa Clause and promises of easy fixes for Wealth creation.

The answer is IN YOUR HEAD FIRST!

Your thoughts and beliefs.

How you spend Ten dollars is exactly how you’ll spend 100 dollars. Or a thousand.

How you handle your credit cards now shows how you will handle them when the limit is increased.

 

Choose Wealthy my friends

 

Toilet paper and wealth

We advocate starting all actions NOW.

1.) Start changing your thought process, NOW!

2.) Start studying wealthy habits and people, NOW!

3.) Reduce personal liabilities (Debt), NOW!

4.) Save money, NOW!

5.) Invest, NOW!

6.) Reinforce your thought process, NOW!

7.) Repeat until perfected.

8.) Teach your children or others.

9.) Reinforce your thought process, NOW!

10.) Repeat until perfected.

 

Let’s discuss number 5.) Invest, NOW!

The simplest, most accessible form of investment are stocks and bonds.

Many folks don’t understand, and therefore FEAR, the stock market and it’s perceived complexity.  Admittedly, a deep-dive into the Stock Market can reveal complexities that rival theoretical physics written in Latin being read aloud by a semi-literate hillbilly with a lisp. Yeah, you know something is happening but it’s damn hard to follow it all.

But Choosing Wealthy is about reducing complexity and helping the average Joe become a wealthier Joe.

Which brings me to toilet paper.

Toilet paper is a requirement of life within our culture.  It is neither good nor bad but always useful in the right situations.  To be without toilet paper is beyond inconvenient.   To have too much is great but having too little?  A pain in the ass.

Imagine you go to your local store to purchase something you really want.  Ice Cream, Soda or just some Asparagus because you are the one person on planet Earth who craves Asparagus over Ice Cream.  Hey, it can happen.  While you’re at the store you notice a giant display of toilet paper with a sign that reads:

TOILET PAPER

TWENTY ROLLS FOR A $1.00!

Being the frugal person you are, you know that last time you bought toilet paper it was about $1.00 for 8 rolls.  Twenty rolls for the same price as eight rolls is a great deal.  You’ll save money on something that has no expiration date and is always useful and in style.

Is that a complex scenario?  I didn’t think so…

How the Stock Market works, nutshell version.

1.) Shares

Imagine you own a piece of paper and you want to share pieces of paper with other people.  How would you do it?

Simple.

Take your paper, get a ruler and divide the paper into, let’s say, 1,000 smaller pieces of paper.

You can now share 1,000 small pieces of paper with other people.

Piece of paper you own= Corporation

Pieces of paper you shared= Shares or Stock in the company.

A share (or stock in) of a company is nothing more than owning small fraction of whole company.  When I purchase an individual stock, I own a small fraction of the company.

A small fraction of their sales, their debts, their assets, their returns and their net profits.

A small fraction in the whole damn shooting match.

2.) Value

Your piece of paper has a value because all the people and companies and investment houses that purchase and sell shares consider your piece of paper to have value.  Part of its value is real, underlying value.  Let’s use Coca-Cola.  Coca-Cola owns the brand name Coca-Cola and all the factories that make Coke and all the trucks that deliver Coke. All the machines that make Coke are worth X but the brand name itself is worth 25X!  Coke is consider non-cyclical because its sales rarely change based on economic factors.  People always buy it.  Coke always makes it.  Its underlying value is consider very stable.

Warren Buffett is considered one of the greatest Value Investors out there.  Click here to understand what he does and what Value Investing means.

Your piece of paper receives some of its value based on assets, brand names and other intrinsic values found in any company.

3.)  Prices change

Remember the movie Men In Black?  Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones are sitting by the river just after Smith found out about all the aliens walking around unnoticed.  He asked why all the secrecy and Jones replies with one of the best descriptions of Mankind ever uttered on-screen:

A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it.

People is the plural of a person.  I am smart. You are smart.  Put a million of us together and we are prone to fear and ignorance of epic proportions.

The Stock Market responds to Fear and Greed as much, if not more than, the intrinsic value of any stocks being traded.  People get excited when a stock price rises.  They buy more hoping to cash in on the ride up.  Brokers typically encourage this behavior due to a commission-based pay structure in many large investment houses.  So Joe Average keeps buying hoping it will continue forever…or at least until the Market closes at 5 pm EST.

That’s Greed, pure and simple. Coke is not suddenly building more factories or buying more trucks or, in most cases, selling more soda on that particular day.  Nope.  Someone started buying more and the perceived value of the stock began to respond.  The more other people want something, the more value still more people will put on it.  See the above quote…

The value holds until the Market closes.  Joe is happy.  Overnight, however, he gets nervous and thinks the stock is probably over-valued.  He sends a text to his broker to sell all his shares tomorrow morning.  That same night, 100,000 owners of Coke stock do the same thing.

The next morning, the price plummets due to the effect of selling.  More people are selling the stock and so the price begins to drop.  Again, did Coke change anything overnight?

Fewer trucks?  Did you or anyone you know suddenly decide to never buy Coke products again?  Nope.

This is Fear.  I’m scared the price will continue to drop so I’ll sell now, Now, NOW!

When poor people see this they see chaos, uncertainty and shenanigans they can not comprehend.

When wealthy people see this they see opportunity, value and a fairly predictable turn of events.

The poor person sees the toilet paper on sale as a deal but declines in the Stock Market as a sign of certain financial doom.

The wealthy person sees the toilet paper on sale as a deal and sees the Stock Market declines as a deal.

If Coke is really worth about 30 bucks a share (numbers made up) and is currently selling at 3 bucks a share (numbers made up), shares in Coke are one hell of a deal!

Wealthy people are fearful when everyone else is greedy.  (When the price was going up, wealthy people, by and large, would’ve avoided it.)

Wealthy people are greedy when everyone is fearful. (When the price drops, wealthy people would wait until they perceive a bottom price, then buy the stock.)

Choosing Wealthy means, in part, understanding the role Fear and Greed have in determining Stock Market prices and the price of other investments.  Real Estate will often go through the same cycles.

Quick real world example.  The US Stock Market is currently hovering in record territory.  18,500+ consistently.  Here is what some of the truly wealthy are doing with their money.

Buy toilet paper when it’s on sale and Choose Wealthy my friends...

Stoic on my friends…

 

Stoicism is an ancient philosophy that once ruled the known world.  It is based on a few simple, but difficult to follow ideas.

Paraphrasing alert….

1.) Our thoughts control our reactions to everything around us.  These things, called externals, include friends, family, property, other people and our own physical bodies.

2.) Fear and Hope are similar in that both are a projection of the future(another external beyond your control).  By projecting either negatively (fear) into the future or positively (hope) into the future, you are attempting to control the future.

3.) People are destined for Rational and Social acts.  We are separated by animals by our ability to Reason and nothing more.  Science will say, “We have X amount of DNA in common with this animal or that animal.”  So be it.  I have Reason.  The animal does not.  If I behave like the animal, I am not a Human.  If we fail to use our Rational Mind to determine our emotions, we are no better than animals.

4.) All pain, sorrow and anguish is due to our thoughts about external things beyond our control.  Controlling something (or someone) beyond our control is irrational.  Therefore, any emotional response like ‘so n’ so makes me mad’ or ‘I’m offended by such n’ such’, is nothing more than an irrational response to a natural event.

5.) People will do bad things.  It is impossible for the world to not contain people who do bad things.  So expecting people to do anything (period!) is again, your attempt to control (through fear and hope) what another person does.

6.) Yeah, this is fun but what the hell does it have to do with Choosing Wealthy?

Short answer:  Everything.

Your desire to control an external will drive you to do things that make no Rational sense.

I will buy this car because my neighbor bought a new car.  Or because it looks nice.  Or because I deserve it.

Now, you may never vocalize these words but that doesn’t matter.  Without the Rational control of your own inner world, you’ll continue to fall for marketing.

If your source of happiness is found in an external (any source of pleasure or pain that can not be 100% controlled by you–which is no source except controlling your Rational mind)…if your source of happiness is found in externals, you are destined for pain. Your pain will lead to a desire for pleasure (pain avoidance) and that will, in turn, lead to pain when the pleasure ends.  It is the nature of Pleasure and Pain to be temporary, thus creating a cycle only broken by Reason.

The drive for external happiness will make your financial decisions for you.

And all other decisions for that matter. What degree to pursue, what type of business to open.  Even what movie you will go see or which book you will buy.

If you are not in control of your own Reasoning Mind, then are not in control, period.  All else is external and beyond your ability.

Back to money…

A new gadget comes out.  You are seeking joy in possessing or using the new gadget.  (Part of you knows this is a holdover thought process from childhood but so what? Right?)

Here we go again…

I can afford the monthly payment and the phone itself is free and I really do like having the newest stuff and my old phone is Okay but why not upgrade?  Successful people don’t like being left behind…

Successful people control their Rational mind, first.  All else flows from there.

Check out this interview with Jack Bogle.

What he’s discussing is the impending Social Security crisis, the impending personal investment crisis and the ignorance (my phrasing) of the average person regarding 401k investments.

All are a reflection of a society in which Externals are held up as answers.

The government will fix it.

The company will fix it.

The union will fix it.

 

Suck it up cupcake!  No one is going to bail you out except that face you find in a mirror.  That’s what Stoicism is, basically.  Understanding that the face in the mirror (which is only a physical shell around the actual YOU) is all you can control.  Although, you don’t actually control your body either.  If you do, try stopping your body from dying.  Tell me again how much control you have?  You control your thoughts which control your emotions and responses.  The body is just a shell…

Back to the cupcakes…

Suck it up!  You must choose to be Rational.  Choose to be Wealthy.

If not, you are choosing to struggle and be poor, both in finances and in spirit.

 

Choose Wealthy my friends.

 

Poor person or Wealthy process?

I recently was in Nashville for work.  I met up with some local friends and we ended up talking about money and in particular starting a business.  Now I LOVE talking about money and business and getting more of either is an aphrodisiac for my soul.   But this post is not about the business idea or how much money it (may) generate.  This blog is about Choosing Wealthy and choosing wealthy is 1.) A choice, which requires a rational, informed thought process and 2.) Wealthy as a thought process,not simply a financial status.  Although the financial status will follow the thought process just as a chair follows the thought process of “Hey, I think I want to build a chair!”

My friend was discussing the business idea and something in his language was off.

He kept talking about how he could build the actual bar and paint the walls.

His wife mentioned how we could pick up inventory at Sam’s Club or Costco and how this would generate higher profits.

They discussed who would be the face of the business, who the manager should be and how they could get their friend, a manager of a similar endeavor, to run it and probably just pay him a bit off the top.

As I was listening, I picked up another way in which people choose a Poverty mindset over a Wealthy mindset.

The Poverty mindset may show up when people discuss starting a business.  You may have done this yourself.  I KNOW I have in the past.

First, let’s discuss the two ways in which people Manage a business and then move back into the Creation of the business.  This will allow you to better see the Poverty mentality/Wealthy mentality paradigms.

There are two methods of managing a business.

1.) People-Dependent Processes

2.) Process-Dependent People

There is a third hybrid type in which a business has a balance of both concepts.  My experience is that the hybrid is rare.

People-Dependent Processes

This is prevalent in every industry for a variety of really bad reasons.  A business culture of People-Dependent Processes is being managed in order to maintain a previous state.  The language sounds like this:

We just need to find the right person for that job.

Oh, don’t worry about that, just send it to Phil.  He knows what to do with it.

I was trained by the last guy before he left.  No, I don’t really have any notes.

This is the way we’ve always done it.

People just don’t seem to know what they’re doing.

This used to be a great place to work.

The idea is that one person, or a few people, know how to do X number of procedures or possess specialize knowledge that makes the person the Hero.  This is most often found in companies that lack Standard Work/SOPs and therefore have weak training programs.

It manifests itself in a entrepreneur this way:

I can renovate the duplex myself.

I can manage the store myself.

I can go by Sam’s and pick up inventory each week.

Granted, sometimes these things do save money up front and allow the boss to grow the business margins.  However, IF this is your focus (How my PERSONAL effort can solve for X.) then you don’t have a business at all.  You have a job.  And chances are high, you’ll end up broke after years of working a job called business ownership.

Process-Dependent People

This is evident in successful businesses of all shapes and sizes.  A culture of Process-Dependent People is being managed for Improvement and Innovation.  The language is like this:

How is our development process going?  

What does the bench look like for Division Manager?

What visuals are we installing to support the changes?

Did you see version 2 of the extrusion process?

We have quarterly review coming up, what improvements have we made?

Send me the project plan for our P & L gaps for this month.

For the entrepreneur:

What vendors do I need to contact?

What is the business structure?  LLC, corporation?

How do I maximize income streams and limit my involvement?

What do my control plans look like?  

What processes do I need in place 60 days prior to open? 30 days? Day one?

YOU

As always, this is about You.  Observe your thought processes when discussing a business idea.  Are you discussing how you can manage, own, work and live at your business 24 hours a day, 7 days a week?  If you are, why are you doing that?  There are dozens if not hundreds of business models that require minimal effort on your behalf.  Why sign up for the hard haul?

Perhaps, the poverty mentality is worming its way into the conversation.  You can’t depend on people anyway, so you might as well do it yourself.  BUT, that is depending on People (YOU) and will eventual fail because (you’re right) people (again, YOU) are not that reliable.  You can’t work 24/7 so why start a business that requires you to do all the work 24/7?

Are you trying to make all the extra money you can at work while ignoring opportunities to invest like 401ks, bonds, stocks, T-bills, real estate, online businesses etc.  In other words, are you actually depending 100% on yourself alone for wealth or are you using  processes to generate wealth for you as you work?

In short, are you dancing with the Poverty mentality by focusing solely on your own effort instead of cultivating the Wealth mentality by seeking out systems, processes, and stand alone streams of income?

Think on it my friend.  Think on it.

I discussed the business idea with my friend but I focused on the structure, pricing, internal processes, roles and responsibilities of employees (not their names?) and how to generate revenue on top of industry standards.  I brought up the marketing plan, contingency plans, revenue management, and business plan overview.

When the visit ended, I was excited about the prospect of the business but hesitant to continue the conversation with my friend.  His mindset would get in the way.  I could foresee his 15% share being paid out because 1.) legally required to do so 2.) Hey, I pick up the sodas every week at Sam’s!  I’m doing all this work!

Sorry, I’m not investing with an employee.  I prefer to invest with business owners and other investors.

Choose Wealthy my friends.

Brief comment from the gallery…

 

We’ve been trained on lies and innuendos.   

Go to school, work hard etc.  Honestly, if you believe that crap now, there is no reason for you to keep reading this.

Going to school, helps, at best.  It helps you check a box of your resume and provides you a modicum of options disallowed to those with only a diploma from Po-Dunk High School.

Working hard?  Not alone, no.  Plenty of people work hard every single day and get no further every single day while wondering what happens to their money every single day.

Nope.

Truth:

School is not a requirement.  Education is…

Working hard is not a requirement.  Working smart AND hard is…

Living below your means?  Absolutely.

Rain or Shine, the choice is mine!

One of the fundamental difference between the Wealth Mentality and the Poverty Mentality can be described as System Thinking.

Here’s the deal:

You walk outside and it is raining.  It pisses you off.  You need an umbrella.  You have to cancel plans.  Or not much happens beyond walking into work/school/stores soaking wet and resembling a frightened rat.

Your mind focused immediately on the Event.  It is Raining.  Water is falling from the sky and therefore, my current Life (expressed as a Day) now SUCKS!

Poverty thought process, squared.

All event-oriented thinking reflects a Poverty mentality.  Poor thinking people focus on the right here, the right now and right away.  That is why they tend to take on excessive debt, buy things they can’t afford and generally engineer the train of life into a wreck.

System thinking is different.

You walk outside and it is raining.  Okay.  You are mostly indifferent to the reality of the rain because you think in terms of the System.  In this case, the rain cycle.  It is going to rain.  That rain collects in all manner of earthly formations and is eventually heated into evaporation.  Then it collect in celestial formations and becomes rain again.

There is nothing you can do about it and, further more, you understand it is necessary to sustain all life on this planet including yours.  What do you do then?

You decide to plan better next time.  Maybe you keep an umbrella in your car or office in case it rains.  Get a weather update sent to your cellphone so you’re better prepared.  When making plans outdoors for several days from now, you check the forecast (from multiple sources so as to better have collective intelligence instead of singular opinions).

In short, you take control of what you can control and you are indifferent to that which you can not control.  You understand the system, respond to it with intelligence and plan accordingly.

Wealth, and all other forms of Success, comes from understanding the Systems that surround us intelligently and responding rationally.

The best baseball players understand how the Game works to a level amateurs do not.

The best employees understand more than just their role in a company.  The understand the culture, the cross-functional systems, the direction and vision of the company.  It is understanding how they fit into the big picture that gives them the advantage when it comes to attitude, promotion potential and pay increases.

There is a book.

THE FIFTH DISCIPLINE by Peter Senge.

 

It was written in 1990 and expanded in 1999.  I know that around 80% of business books are purchased and never read.  They go from a great idea to purchase to nightstand to bookshelf to attic box to yard sale in about a decade.

But if you wish to develop System Thinking, one of the hallmarks of not only the Wealth Mentality but relevant to businesses of all dimension…BUY THIS DAMN BOOK!

 

CHOOSE WEALTHY, MY FRIENDS…

 

 

 

 

Thank you Uncle…now back to work…

Ah, it is the most wonderful time of the year!  Tax Refund season!

That glorious time when people remember the old adage about Tax Season being an equalizer:

We file taxes like a Republican and expect a refund like a Democrat. 

Now don’t get yourself all knotted up, this is not a political post.  Just a whimsical way of pointing out a truth.

________________________

So what to do?  What to do?  Chances are good you’re getting back some if not all of what you paid.  Some of you may be getting a LOT more back than you paid for a variety of reasons including EIC (Earned Income Credit), Education expenses or presto-chango you had a new baby.  Or two.  Or three.  Hey, it happens.  Winters have been colder of late so if you’ve popped a papoose who can blame you?

Extra money comes in and man-oh-man it’s tempting to buy that shiny new toy.  Get those Cruise tickets in advance.  Buy a new washer.  Fix up the clunker you call Esther.  Or just blow that wad on weekends of wanton lust and debauchery at your local inn of ill-repute…

But here on this blog (despite the posts being so few and far between this does still technically constitute a Blog!) we deal with Choosing Wealthy.

We deal with Choosing the wealth mentality over the poverty mentality.

The Wealth mentality involves delayed gratification.  Yes for those paying attention we do love, admire and otherwise want to imbibe with The 4-Hour Work Week and the New Rich lifestyle but even that gravy train of luscious travelling involves (involved?) Delayed Gratification.

You have to invest Time to get Time.  You have to invest Money to get Money.  The new rich just invest less Time than the old Rich.  Less money than the old rich.  Et cetera, et cetera…

 

An extra $2,900 pops into your account.  {2014 Tax season average refund as $2900.00} what would Choosing Wealthy tell you to do…

In no particular order because each situation is different:

1.) Pay down useless, consumer-oriented debt. Student loans are great to pay off early since you’re less likely to incur one again.  Credit Cards are great to pay off provided you A.) Have the discipline to never go back or if not, B.) Burn the bitches up in a fiery hell of debt-free joyousness.

2.) Save.  Oh God, not that again.  Yes, that again.  Saving CASH for emergencies, unforeseen and even foreseen expenses (Christmas is no surprise is it?) is a brilliant move despite inflation, low interest and potential opportunity costs.  But face it: if you’re not an active investor or plan on being one tomorrow, your basic Savings Passbook is a decent place to hold CASH for liquidity, security and overall peace of mind.

3.) Pay down/off your vehicle.  Contrary to popular opinion, millions of people drive around each day in paid-for cars.  I know, I know…you just saw a car ad twenty minutes ago that promised you good terms, ZERO interest, cash back and a great rate on a car lease.

{On a car lease, do me this solid.  Look at the monthly lease payment, then the number of months.  Multiply.  BOOM-that’s the cost of depreciation the vehicle will incur during those months.  Example:  Three year lease (36 months) for $250.00 per month.  Multiply 36 X 250.00= $9,000.  That car will depreciate approximately $9,000 in the next 3 years.  No, it’s not science but it’s close enough to the Rule of 72 for you to understand…You are paying the depreciation costs, returning the car and the dealer resells that car having taken no inventory risks.  You, my friend, played the sucker bet… But hey, they’ll put you in another lease, no worries. :-))}

4.)  If you have no useless debt, car debt or a silly little lease… Consider putting some of it down on the principle balance of your mortgage.  A modest payment directly to principle can reduce overall interests paid, number of monthly payments and add Peace of Mind to  your Golden Years.

5.) Invest in yourself or business through education or some other necessary asset.  If you have a business, consider investing some of your return directly into that business.  Where?  Not telling you since you’re situation is your own.  But it is an idea.

6.) Retirement account. Roth or Traditional IRA.  Watch this though as the market swings to and fro.  Buying when everyone is buying is stupid and costs you bunches of long term growth.  Selling when everyone is selling is stupid because it is a race to the bottom price for buyers.  Buy when everyone is selling. Sell when everyone is buying.

6.)  A wee bit of charity might go a long way on your road to Choosing Wealthy.Give some money away to a local, national or international charity in which you believe.

Remember, becoming Wealthy isn’t about your car, it’s about your character…

Choose Wealthy My Friends.

 

John.

 

 

Who gets the bookshelf?

I was checking out my bookshelf the other day and noticed a few trends.  Themes, if you will.

Obvious theme:  Money and personal finance.

Not so obvious theme:  Writers of infamous reputation.

Perhaps these go together.  Henry Miller was indeed a rebellious writer but isn’t becoming wealthy in America also a bit of rebellion.  Not falling for the poor-me-I’m-down-because-they-are-up mentality so prevalent in our society requires a bit of backbone and plain old stubbornness not unlike that required to change literary history.

As I stared at my bookshelf further I noticed a word that has captivated and freed me throughout my Life.

Millionaire.

No, I am not a millionaire so the freedom to which I speak is not financial  freedom in that sense.  I’ll explain.

There is a saying I will not quote nor research.  Paraphrased:  If you want to hit the mountain, aim for the stars.  The idea is that you will stumble and perhaps fall but if you aim for higher than your actual goal, you’re more likely to ‘fail’ and still succeed.

When I read about Millionaires, millionaire habit and the wealth mentality, I’m not sure my goal is to become a multi-millionaire.  Sad. Confusing.  But true.  I look at it as if I’m aiming for the Stars knowing I’ll probably hit the Mountain.

I’ve learned dozens of things a few of which I’ll list briefly.  These are quick Millionaire habits I’ve picked up on over the years.

-Keep consumer debt low.  Debt is a method of attaining assets only when you are 100% sure the asset will cover the debt.

-Pay yourself first.  This is harder than most realize until they start.  Upside-shortly after you start, you realize how easy it can be.

-Tell the truth.  Start this one with yourself.  A person who tells themselves Lies can not be trusted by anyone.

-Saving and Investing are two separate things.  Saving is for emergencies and short-term needs (new car, Christmas, birthdays, etc.)  Investing is for long-term goals (new house, real estate/business investments, college, retirement)  Wealthy people understand they are separate but connected.  You can’t invest without saving and saving without investing is ineffective long term.

 

Question for you.  Even if I never become a Millionaire or incredibly wealthy, is there anything listed above that won’t help my overall financial future?

Answer: Not at all.

The key is to understand that it is the JOURNEY for many people.  If you keep consumer debt low, pay yourself first, tell the truth and understand saving v. investing-you’ll be better off.

And so will your children.

And so will your spouse.

And so will anyone who inherits your bookshelf.

 

Choose Wealthy my friends

-John.

 

What does YES really mean without NO?

 

I went to seminar a few weeks ago and heard this quote:

 

Yes is meaningless without the power to say no.

 

More on it later but I thought I would throw it out there.

 

Does it really matter if your employees, kids, spouse or friends say “YES!” to your ideas IF they don’t have the empowerment necessary to say NO!?

 

Choose Wealthy my friends.