How to Get Wealthy (Without Any Hacks)
A cheatsheet unlike anything you've ever seen
The path to wealth is stupidly simple.
Common problems that people never solve keep them broke. If you can reframe common problems into solutions, you win.
Here’s my cheatsheet (steal).
Not sure what to do –––––> Start
There are infinite ways to generate wealth.
But if you never make a decision and choose a path, it’s an impossible dream that feels like death. None of us know what to do to get wealthy. The ones like me who figure it out just start.
University teaches us that we need to know all the answers upfront and spend 4 years and $100,000 to get ready to start. In the real world this is how you sink to the bottom of life like the Titanic.
Be okay with NOT knowing. Start with the smallest possible action. Turn that action into a habit, then add a system to it as you evolve.
Broke –––––> Get new skills
An obvious blocker to wealth is being broke.
Some people will use this excuse for their entire life. But being broke is a temporary situation. You’re not supposed to stay there. You’re meant to change. How? By learning new skills.
Your annual income is made up of the skills you possess. If money is hard to come by, then it’s a blinking red siren telling you to upgrade your skills.
If you don’t take action on the warning, you only get broker.
None of us, including me, can escape the broke trap. We can only self-educate ourselves out of it. There’s infinite amounts of money with the right skill stack.
Embrace self-learning after hours.
“Life sucks” –––––> Go to therapy
More people need to go to therapy.
In my darkest hours of 2011, I resisted going to therapy. I was afraid people would find out. I knew I needed help but I didn’t want to get any – and I didn’t want to pay $150 a session to get it.
But if your entire worldview is “life sucks",” then likely, you’re deeply depressed. A random guy on the internet like me isn’t qualified to help you.
The smartest people in the world are in therapy.Every successful person goes there at least once, so it should no longer be taboo. Get help. Heal the mind. See the world as a bright place again.
Distracted –––––> Focus on one goal
The clients I coach all suffer from one big bat virus: busyness.
If you’re busy you’re useless. A freaking rock in a garden bed is more useful than a busy person stuck in a tornado of meetings full of useless agendas run by even more useless managers who know nothing.
The default mode of humans in 2024 is distracted.
If you choose this setting, too, then your value crashes to zero and financial problems are a given. Especially in a world of AI that can outsmart us and focus better than a drunk dude in a strip club full of g-strings.
It’s either one goal or no goal. Because if you have lots of goals you’ll likely never achieve much. Mastery in one field takes too long.
Light your goals list on fire. Choose one big goal.
No experience –––––> Build in public
We all start with zero experience.
So how do you gain credibility to sell a product/service on the internet and make money from it? You “build in public.”
The simple meaning behind this catchphrase is you take your project and open source it on social media for anyone to watch. You give people behind the scenes access.
This removes the need to be an expert/guru because you’re admitting that you’re building your project (that’ll likely morph into a business) without all the answers. Humble businesses are just more fun to create.
Let people online join your movement and build with you.
Hate job –––––> Build a side business
Most people hate their jobs. Nothing new.
So what are you gonna do … stay the same … or do something about it? The fastest way to exit the job game is to build a side business. Take a passion and turn it into an obsession. Then make that obsession into a business.
Keep your job until the income from your side business equals your salary, then politely quit your boss forever without any drama.
Wealth is generated by businesses, not salaries.
No customers –––––> Build a social media audience
We all start with zero customers. To fix this problem build a community on social media. Then turn those followers into email subscribers. Now you have potential customers for your business.
A dog with half a testicle and no eyes could figure this out. Do it.
Burned out –––––> Stop doing work you don’t give a f*ck about
You only need weekends and vacations when you hate your career.
Work time never ends for those who give a f*ck about what they do. My work is writing. I’m writing right now as I battle Covid. Because nothing stops me. I’m obsessed. I’m married to writing. It serves me in the good times and the hard times.
Work that lacks creativity and requires you to sit in boring meetings all day is what burns us out. Trade that type of work for a labor of love.
Impatient –––––> 10 year goals
There are no fast paths to wealth.
No get-rich-quick scheme works. What works is choosing an obsession and chasing it for at least 5 years (ideally 10). Too many people are impatient. They’re focused on the outcome instead of the journey.
But the journey to wealth is the best part. It’s where all the nostalgia and “the good old days” come from. Don’t skip the best bit.
Make a decision and commit.
Can’t find a passion –––––> Chase obsession
The reason most people never find their passion is because it’s a piss-weak compass.
Some days I don’t mind the cat next door to my house. She’s fluffy. Funny. And she purrs nicely. I’m not crazy about her though. If she got run over tomorrow by a car, I’m not sure I’d notice. That’s what passion looks like.
My 1 year old daughter, on the other hand, is my entire world. I’m obsessed with her. Every move she makes. Everything she does. Today she had her first dentist visit and wore two pigtails in her hair for the first time.
When it comes to my daughter, I’m a psycho.
I take photos of her like I’m the paparazzi chasing Princess Diana in a car. I’m relentless. All day I think about her. As I slam my keyboard typing this, there’s a photo of her looking up at me. That’s what obsession feels like.
When you choose obsession it’s effortless. The intensity and urgency go from a lukewarm 2 out of 10 to a 1100 out of 10.
To the outside world you look insane in the brain. Good.
Nothing extraordinary was ever birthed out of lukewarm bubble baths and softcore passion mixed with “being interested.”
Take passion and turn it into obsession.
Busy –––––> Say no to everything
Time is all you have.
Don’t f*ck it up by pissing your time against the wall and being busy. If you feel busy then say no to everything. I mean, everything. Watch how much time you get back.
F*ck people’s feeling and how they’ll get pissed off at you for cancelling. What’ll really piss you off is a life of mediocrity full of regrets.
Stop saying true to your word. Let people down so you don’t let yourself down.
No urgency –––––> Get cancer motivation
The average person moves at a snail’s pace.
They sleepwalk through life, looking at a phone screen like a zombie addicted to heroin. You can’t tell if they have a pulse.
Their faces are lifeless because they’re stuck in a doom scroll on their phone punctuated by the sharp sound of PING! PING! PING! … from all the notifications. The best way to move faster is to change your perception of time.
Go to a hospital and visit a cancer patient. Even better, smoke 100s of packs of cigarettes or eat a few hundred Big Macs and get cancer yourself. Now life becomes urgent because there is an expiry date.
You’re not getting any younger. Energy goes down, not up, as you get older – just look at Joe Biden. You wanna be president at 20, 30 or 40, not at 80 or 90. Be patient with the outcomes but unreasonably fast with taking action.
The cemetery is loaded with unrealized potential. Don’t screw up any more graves.
Final Thought
When you solve these common problems the roadblocks are removed.
It’s now so much easier to get wealthy when you have time, obsession, automated motivation, the right people by your side, a 10-year vision, patience, one goal, zero distractions, and a business as a vehicle to generate unlimited cash.
Go get wealthy you s*xy beast. Then pay it forward by helping others prosper.
Tell me which of these ideas you struggle with the most and why in the comments.
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Mostly my age, 63. It feels too late yet I am drawn to your words. Definitely still trying to figure out the obsession piece. I have plenty of expertise and skills but I am bored to death with all of them. What I am really obsessed about I guess is politics....like there are not already a billion people writing about that! Perhaps I could combine that somehow with my expertise (mental health, neuroscience) I am defintely thinking about the last chapter of my career (the next 7 years if I stay healthy) and how to make it really matter in terms of giving me the life I want in my 70's. I still have alot fo hard work left in me and want to use it wisely.
Distracted –––––> Focus on one goal - I needed to hear that one, my friend.
THANKS for the WHOLE ENCHILADA -- great food for thought, with a side of guac!