You alone are solely and completely responsible for your current financial situation. Before you react defensively, read that sentence again. I didn’t say you are the cause of your situation. I said you are responsible for it.
By taking responsibility for you current condition, you also assume responsibility for your future. Nobody can change your fortune but you. And nobody else will. The sooner you accept that reality, the sooner you will shed the anger and blame and begin to feel financially powerful. I’m not giving you a pep talk. I’m telling you the truth. I’ve done it myself, and I’ve coached dozens of people to do it, too. It is a simple adjustment of your thinking, but it is extremely powerful. It works instantaneously. Without it, you cannot move forward, even by a single inch.
The next thing you must do is to set realistic expectations. I have had people tell me that they don’t want to make 10% or 15% on their money. They think returns like that are ho-hum. They want some incredible stock tip or some secret get-rich-quick technique. But when I hear people say that, I think, “This person will never become wealthy.”
First of all, 10%-15% is a high rate of return. Warren Buffett, the most successful investor of all time and the third richest person on the planet, has averaged 19% on his investments over his entire career.
Secondly, realize that the journey to millions of dollars is earned one hundred dollars at a time. You must be willing to accept this fact in order to move your financial life forward. Your financial life is like a train that has stalled, and right now, you want to be driving it at a hundred miles an hour. But it can’t go from zero to a hundred miles an hour in no time flat. Inertia is against you. Be happy with ten miles an hour now and then twenty and then thirty. This is how wealth accumulates: gradually at first but eventually at lightning speed.
The third thing you must do is reread my essay on the “three bucket system” for managing your money. I sent you that when you first subscribed. You must thoroughly understand the difference between spending, saving, and investing.
And the fourth thing you must do is to recognize that your net investible income (the amount of cash you have after spending and saving) is the single most important factor in determining how quickly you will become wealthy.
The world of wealth is governed by universal dynamics—supply, demand, wealth, greed, etc. These dynamics are as old as human civilization. Winning the wealth-building game is about recognizing and exploiting those dynamics, not denying them. Our job at The Palm Beach Letter is to highlight those dynamics on a weekly and monthly basis and then help you make smart, enriching decisions—the sort of decisions that have made men wealthy for thousands of years.
It’s not fun to realize, in the midst of your life, that you haven’t acquired the wealth you want. But the good news is that your past doesn’t have to be a prologue, unless you allow it to. You can change your fortunes today by doing the four things I’ve just told you to do.
Let me be a bit more specific:
Accept responsibility for your future. Refuse to complain, criticize, or condemn. If you want us to help you achieve your goals, then trust in and follow our advice. Stop doubting it. Stop denying it. Have faith.
Give up the foolish notion that you must get rich “now.” Be happy to earn 10% or 15% on your stock market investments. Realize that if you make 10% to 15%, you will be ahead of 99% of your fellow investors. Embrace the huge impact this will have on your wealth over time.
Begin to allocate your income according to the three-bucket system. With every paycheck you get, first cover your necessary expenses (bills, mortgage, etc.) Then put some money toward saving and then some money toward investing. Then and only then—after you have “paid yourself”—should you add to your “spending” account.
Stop complaining about making “only $27” an hour. That’s more than a lot of people make. Be grateful you earn that much. Commit to add to that with a second income. Make an honest count of the number of hours each month you devote to television and other non-productive activities. Devote them to wealth-building instead. Cast aside the comfortable shoes of victimization. Put on the working boots of a financial hero.
If you are willing to do that, we can help you succeed. We are giving you investment recommendations that could give you realistic 10% to 15% returns (and sometimes much more.) You can buy the books I’ve written on how to earn more money and save more money. And we will be preparing additional reports on these subjects exclusively for our Palm Beach Lettersubscribers. We are fully committed to giving our readers more valuable and realistic wealth building advice than any other investment newsletter in the market. We have the experience and the know-how to do that. We will deliver if you do.
Now I want to address another comment you made:
You suggest that you don’t have the wherewithal to implement some of my recommendations. You suggest that buying apartments and starting businesses is something only wealthy people can do. You are dead wrong on this subject. If you are willing to work hard and smart, you can begin building your own business empire with as little as a thousand dollars – if you want to. The businesses I’ve started can all be started for that kind of money or less. Again, I will explain how this is true in future issues and reports. If you stick around and trust us, you’ll learn how you can do the same.
The good news is that you are only forty-seven, not eighty-seven. You have plenty more years to increase your income and grow your net worth. Why do you assume that all is lost when, as any eighty-seven-year-old will tell you, you have a whole wonderful life ahead of you, a life that can be rich in a hundred ways?
Everybody in your situation has the same choice: you can rue your situation or you can dedicate yourself to changing it. We can show you how. For the equivalent of a tank of gas, or a dinner out you are getting a whole year of realistic investment and wealth-building research and advice from me, Tom, and Paul Mampilly. You have what you need to get your gravy train moving. But you are the engineer. Nobody but you can start the engine.
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