Money

  1. Money is important, and more important is to learn to handle it. People who preach that money is not everything and that it’s evil are foolish, because the same people will work their asses off their whole life to earn it.
  2. Money is important it can buy many things, but most importantly it buys you freedom of your own time.
  3. Money is a game, it’s fun if you know the rules, you can play it well.


Pay checks and being an Employee

  1. Pay checks are addictive. Once you get used to earning money that way, it’s hard to move away, but it’s necessary.
  2. Don’t take a job for a pay check, take it to learn a skill.
  3. Job security, pension plans are traps and cages restricting you from achieving true financial freedom.
  4. Don’t work for money, let money work for you.
  5. Pay yourself first. When you get a pay check, don’t start paying off bills as the first thing. Pay yourself first and then do the bills and expenses.


Failures and Disappointments

  1. Be ready to fail, for it will teach you the things you must know for success. But more importantly learn those lessons from those failures.
  2. Be prepared for disappointments. Like we say with each problem there comes an opportunity, same is with disappointments. Inside every disappointment lies a priceless gem of wisdom. Turn your disappointment into an asset instead of a liability.
  3. Be kind to yourself. Don’t beat yourself up for the mistakes you have done, learn from them.
  4. Be true to yourself.


Debt

  1. Paying off your debts is the first step to becoming financially free.
  2. Debt is not always bad. There are good debts and bad debts. When you are paying yourself for your debt, it’s a bad one. When you make others pay for it, it’s a good debt. 
E.g. Buying an apartment on debt and making the tenants pay for it. The net will eventually show up in your asset column.
  3. If you are buying those cars, houses on debt, it’s not smart. Don’t fool yourself by looking rich, the idea is to be one. Your financial statement should reflect that - more assets than liabilities.


Mentor

  1. Find a mentor, who has achieved where you want to get. Professionals have coaches, amateurs don’t.
  2. Have a few emergency contacts for financial mentors, people who are just a call away when you are in a difficult position.
  3. Have role models, also anti role models - people who you don’t want to become. You can learn equally important lessons from them.
  4. Be careful whose advice you listen to. Don’t take advice from people who haven’t done the same thing for themselves. Most advisors themselves are in E or the S quadrant.


Learn

  1. Invest in yourself, you are your biggest asset.
    • Be healthy. Invest in your body, physically.
    • Invest in your mind, its your most important asset. Learn new skills, learn to be financially independent. Learn, learn and learn.
  2. There’s no escape from numbers. You have to get good at that. Words are for naive people, numbers are for financially educated. Numbers never lie, they’ll always tell you the truth.
  3. You need to train your mind to see things your eyes can’t.
  4. Invest in learning, buy courses, attend seminars, go to business conferences, follow the people who are there where you want to get.


Investment

  1. Have financial advisors - for they know a lot more than you do.
  2. Pay your financial advisors well - if you pay them well and keep them happy - it will do wonders in your investments.
  3. Your investors are only as smart as you. They can advise you only as much as you are financially educated.
  4. Changing quadrants from E (employee) to B (business) or I (investor) is not just a switch in what you do. It’s a much bigger change in what you are. It’s an emotional and psychological and mental switch. It’ll take time, but you can do it.
  5. Your house is not an asset. It can be an asset or a liability depending on where on your balance sheet does it show up. If its adding money to your pocket, only then it’s an asset, it’s a liability otherwise.
  6. The rich don’t pay taxes, they have their ways to legally exempt from taxes. They get [income - expenses and then taxes]. Where as for employees it is [income - taxes and then expenses]. It makes a huge difference.
  7. Every time you add a liability in your balance sheet, you are adding an asset in someone else’s. You are making someone else rich.


Action

  1. Take baby steps, don’t jump into investing without knowing. Learn first, and take baby steps. Simply put little money, pay attention and learn.
  2. The key is to take action. Learning, educating yourself is important, but you also must start doing.
  3. Have well-defined goals for the next one year and 5 years. E.g. I want my passive income to be increased by _____ after this year. Or I want to have assets in real estate, stocks in next 5 years.