Attitude and Determination Win with Mel Abraham

Welcome to True Grit and Grace, a podcast designed to empower you to claim your resilience and thrive through life's challenges. I am Amberly Lago, a mindset coach, fitness expert, and bestselling author. Each week, I'll dive deep with the world's brightest thought leaders and elite performers to share tangible tools and practical advice to inspire you to keep your eyes on the prize and forge ahead. So get ready to conquer your fears, heal any trauma, lead with your heart, and elevate your life with grit and grace. Well, hello and thank you for tuning in to the True Grit and Grace podcast. I just want to say you might want to grab a pen and a piece of paper today because you're going to be inspired, but you are going to learn so much. I have the one and the only Mel Abraham on with us today, and he's the top financial advisor, or a lot of people call him the affluent mentor. He's the thought leader to thought leaders. He's worked with some of the top entrepreneurs. Thought leaders and motivational speakers out there. He, you know, is their financial advisor and really helps them with their business. He's a CPA by education, but an entrepreneur by exhilaration. I'm telling you, he makes learning about finances fun and easy, especially for people like me. He has got a bestselling book called The Entrepreneur's Solution. It's the modern millionaire's path to more profit, Fans and Freedom. He's the founder of Thoughtpreneur Academy and the Business Breakthrough Academy. And I've learned so much from his podcast. It's called The Affluent Entrepreneur Show. I actually had the honor of being a guest on his show. He is an overcomer, and his triumphant story of kicking cancer's butt is so inspiring. So, Mel, thank you so much for being here.

Oh my God, this is a joy. I, I've been looking forward to this, so I, I can't wait to, to jump in and have some fun.

Well, I, I really have learned so much from your podcast. I binge it, and you really do break things down in such a way that it makes it fun and it makes it easy to understand. And I think that, you know, after my motorcycle accident, we talked about this on your, your show, how I realized I didn't really— I didn't have any systems in place. I did not, you know, I had savings and my husband couldn't access that because we had different bank accounts and I was in a coma. And we quickly went through my savings once I was up from a coma and we decided, oh, we need a joint account. We just learned a lot of lessons. And you, in your journey, you've really now helping so many people. So God forbid something like a major catastrophe or adversity comes, they are set. But also, hopefully, if something like that doesn't happen, they have financial freedom, like really liberation. And I'd like to go back to 2019 and talk about your journey and, and what really— because I feel like you've got a fire lit up under you and you are helping so many people. But I'd like to go back to the time when you first found out that you had cancer. Can you take us back to that and how you got through that? Yeah.

I mean, first off, not that anyone expects to get cancer. It certainly wasn't anything— no one in my family ever had cancer, and I had no pain. I had no symptoms, really. And then all of a sudden— this may be too much for the show, but it was bladder cancer— I started to see blood in the urine.

And believe me, it's not too much for this show.

So, and I let it go, the typical guy thing to do. I don't know, you just go away, something happened, I don't know, you know. So I started to let it go. But, you know, blessed to my wife, uh, who's been in the medical field for years. And I started— I was traveling and speaking, and I asked her, she goes, how long has it been? And, and, uh, she says, we need to get you in. And that, that started this whole ripple effect. I said, why? She— She wouldn't tell me because she didn't want to diagnose me. But, you know, what did I do? I went to the most evil doctor on the land, Dr. Google, and went into a dark place because I started to see what was possible. But so I heard the words. I went and saw this surgeon, the very first surgeon we saw. And he said, you know, you have cancer. And I, if we put it in perspective of what my life was like, life was great. I'd finished a multi-six-figure launch. I'm speaking on some of the biggest stages. I'm masterminding with some of the top entrepreneurs. I had 2 weeks before the diagnosis, I was flying back on a private jet with a number of these entrepreneurs. I mean, life was really good. And then 2 weeks after that, it got turned on its head without, you know, they looked at me and said, you don't have the risk factors. You know, they said the average age for this type of cancer is like 73. And I go, well, unless mom lied on my birth certificate, there is no I'm 73.

Yeah.

Not a smoker, not a drinker. That put me into a tailspin. I mean, to be, to be honest, it put me into a dark place because I was struggling to figure out why me? What did I do to deserve this? What did I do to have this? And I think one of the big epiphanies for me was the only way I got out of it is I stopped looking in the past. I knew life was changing and it was changing forever. I remember the, the final surgeon that I saw that was going to do The surgery says you and I will have a relationship for the rest of your life.

Wow.

But I think one of the things that, that really got me to start to look differently at it was this, is that too often I think we look to the past for our why. And I think in your case, you could have done the same thing. Why did this happen to me? Why would the accident happen? Why did COVID happen? Why did any of this happen? We tend to look in the past. And when we're looking in the past, I realized I was looking for someone or something to blame. And what if the why is actually in the future? What if I have the opportunity to look forward and say, what am I going to make this cancer mean? What, what are the lessons here that allow me to make it a positive thing? And that's what started to get me out of that, that bitter, dark hole that I was in. And, you know, to start living again, to start saying, okay, if this is what it is, then the first thing I got to do is, is conquer it. The first thing I got to do is, is get after it and make sure that it doesn't leave me in this dark place. And, you know, my team of doctors said, we've never had anyone attack it the way you did. I said, well, it wasn't always that way.

Yeah, well, you know what, I think you really went from— I think it's normal when we are— when something happens, we ask why. And it's— but it's if we stay there, that's—

Yeah.

Puts us— it makes us feel like a victim. But when we decide to totally take like radical accountability for, well, this is what it is, what can I learn from it? We start to— it puts us in the driver's seat of our life, and then we can make the best decisions to move forward and heal. But Were you able to work through that, or did you stop everything and like, I am just focused on my health and getting through this? Because that's the scary part. I mean, even through COVID, a lot of people who've lost their jobs or gotten really sick with COVID and weren't able to work, and they're like, but how do I continue making money? How do I make sure I don't lose my house? All those things, that fear comes up. About not just health, but your finances, your relationship, everything?

It— this is such a huge question. So first, I will say that I was blessed by the fact that I was a single full-time dad for a long time, and was trying to make sure that I was there for my son. And in that process, I realized because I was in a type of business as at that time as a consultant, where I was, in a sense, swapping hours for dollars. I had to figure out how do I get my— to me, wealth, wealth and richness is not measured in money. Too often we measure it in money. It really should be measured in time. And how much of my time do I control? Because I could be uber wealthy, I could have hundreds of millions of dollars in the bank. But if I don't control any of my time, it's a poor life. I mean, You might look at it and say, it's a poor life in an Aston Martin and a private jet or whatever, you know, people are driving, but it's still a poor life. They're still struggling and suffering. And so, I was blessed early on to start looking at how do I do business differently? How do I do life differently? How do I give myself, not for the sake of cancer, but for the sake of independence, for the sake of that timing? So, To go to your question, I was blessed enough to know that I would be okay financially if I stopped completely, completely stopped working. I also knew that, that in order to really go after the cancer the way I wanted to, I needed to stop working. I needed to be 100% focused on healing and fighting this, this, this thing.

Yeah.

I mean, they found The first CT scan said it was a 5-centimeter tumor that they found in the bladder. When they went in, it turned out to be 7.5 centimeters. It was 6.5 hours of surgery to get it out. When they went in, it was— before they went in, they told me, it's on the prostate. We might have to remove the prostate. We might have to put a tube in for the— because we can't see the ureter on the right side, a tube in for the kidney and a bag for the kidney.

Oh.

If it's bad, you lose your bladder. So I mean, I was, I was living in a moment where everything I knew as an active individual, as someone who, who used physicality and communication, was just put in jeopardy. And so I said, I can't, I can't, I can't do anything but put 100% into the healing. And, and so that's the, that was the, the way I did it. Now, it was—

How long was that? How long were you Really, you know, after the surgery and really focused on your healing, how much time did you take off of work?

I pretty much didn't, didn't start working again until the beginning of this year.

Wow, really?

Almost 2 years.

Well, you know what, I appreciate you sharing that and how important that is because I have a lot of people, you know, I wasn't even on social media after my motorcycle accident. I spent years like 3, 4 years healing, in and out of surgeries. And I think it's important for people to know that, that, you know, they see, you know, inspirational transformational pictures or something on a highlight reel of people, how they had this horrible accident or they overcame something, and it looks like they just got through it. And it's like, no, it does take a long time if you want to do it. The right way?

We hit it— it was one of those things that I hit it with everything I had. Well, back in the day, I used to fight competitively, uh, in the martial arts. So I said, this is another fight. When I fought competitively, I had people in my corner. I had people that were my, my footwork guys, my handwork, uh, people, my, uh, strength, my conditioning, my corner, you know, all these people. that would keep me in the ring and keep me fighting. And I— and so I said, well, this is no different except this time it's for my life.

Wow.

And, um, and so I put a whole team of doctors together and I sat them down and I said, here's the thing, you can't fight the fight for me. That's my fight to fight. I got to get in the ring and I got to fight it. But what you can do is make sure, absolutely make sure That I will be the strongest possible at this fight that, that I've ever been or that you've ever seen. And I said, that means I need you to push me. I don't need negativity. I need you all working together as a team. I don't, I don't care that I'm working Western, Eastern, holistic all together. I'm not taking sides. I don't care what works. I care that something works. But I need you all in the corner. And if you're game to play that game with me, then let's do it. If you're not, that's fine. Step aside. I'll find someone else.

That is powerful. Like, you were your own advocate and were like, this is what we're going to do.

Yeah.

You know, Mel, that reminds me of when I was in the hospital and I, you know, I was finally transported to Cedars. And the first time all the doctors came into the room and they huddled around, it was like It reminded me of like right before a football game where they're all huddled around. And they're all huddled and they're looking at the screen and the screen is not facing me. And one of the doctors turned around and he said, well, do you want to see the X-ray? And I said, yep, I need to see what this looks like. I want to be a part of this and I'm ready to fight to save my leg. And he said, okay, well, I hope you have a strong stomach. And I was like, here we go. And they turned Turn the screen around. And I had a team of people. I had the orthopedic, the plastic surgeon who had to do the skin grafts. I had the pain doctors. I had the pulmonary doctor. This team. The one thing that I didn't mention that I love that you mentioned is that you said, I don't want negativity.

Yeah.

Because I did get some of that, but I used, I learned to use that as my biggest motivation. But I love that you took accountability and you surround yourself with good people. And I think that no matter if you're fighting in the ring or you're fighting for your life or whatever, you're fighting for your dreams, it's important to have those good people around you while you're healing, especially while you're healing. So they did the— how many surgeries did you end up having?

So I ended up having 3 surgeries. They took out 4 tumors in the 3 surgeries, and I Went through 37 treatments. I'm actually— no, 38 treatments, because I'm, believe it or not, I'm actually in the middle of another 3-week round of treatments right now. I started last week, and I have 2 more weeks of it.

You are? How does it make you feel when you have those treatments?

It takes me down for a little bit. These are preventative. One of the problems with bladder cancer, evidently, is it's a high, high— it's one of the highest recurring rates out there. I mean, the good news is that prostate's intact, bladder's intact, all that, the ureter and the kidney, everything is fine. So we're on— we're now instead of playing defense, we're on the offense. We're doing everything. So with the doctors, I said, all right, now I want us ultra-aggressive on prevention and detection. So what that means is that we're doing preventative treatments instead of in 3-week spurts. And then I'll go back in 6 weeks after the final treatment to do another scope. As long as it stays clear, and I've been clear for over a year now.

Oh, thank goodness. That is amazing.

Yeah, they'll space them out. That's why he said to me, we're in a relationship for the rest of your life. This is something that we're going to want to— because once it pierces the bladder wall, the whole game changes for me. And so I said, well, let's not give it a chance. And here's the other blessing. If that means that I have to do a procedure that the insurance says they're not going to cover, that's fine. I'll cover it. I don't care. I, I'm, I'm, I'm a husband, I'm a father, and I'm a brand new grandfather. I said, I'm going to be there to make sure that I watch my granddaughter walk down that aisle.

Wow. Oh wow, that's— and congratulations on your beautiful grandchild. I just saw the picture the other day. Gorgeous. Do you think that being an athlete, being, you know, a fighter, helped you really prepare and get through this mentally for, for your— all the surgeries and the healing that you went through?

I, I think it, it, it did. I think both the athletics and the entrepreneurship, because In both cases, you're going to be dealt adversity. In both cases, you're going to be dealt with pressure. You're going to be dealt with things that just don't go your way. And you can either wallow in the pity and the sorrow of it all. And I know that's easy for me to say, but at the same time, and I've had some horrible things happen, but you can look at the the hand you're dealt and say, okay, what are the things I can control? Let me spend my time there. Because if it's out of my control and I spend my time, I'm wasting what little effort, what little control I have. And I think that I got from the martial arts, from the competitive sports, and from entrepreneurship. Because inevitably things didn't always go the way we want.

Oh, for sure. For sure. Especially this past year, everything just seems to change and it's learning to be flexible and resilient and to get back up and try different ways. But I too think that athleticism taught me a lot about perseverance, figuring out different ways to do things, failing a lot. Oh boy, did I have a lot of failure as a dancer and rejections as a dancer. And then, yeah. And all these things, it's like, if you can look at it and say, okay, well, what am I learning from it? How can I grow from it? But also, I really admire the fact that you did everything that you could. You didn't sit back and wait for doctors to magically heal you. You changed every— you changed the way you eat. You really focused on your health and you changed a lot. You learned how to eat differently. I mean, You ate pretty healthy before, but now it's like you go out to dinner and you're not eating the, you know, chips and salsa and margaritas. You've changed it all. Was that a hard process, or is that a hard process? Are you— how did you go about doing that?

So I, I think the biggest— my biggest vice was that I had a sweet tooth. I wasn't ever really—

And sugar's the devil.

Oh my gosh. And you don't realize it. And I was making an excuse for it because I said, well, I work out all the time and everything. I can, you know, it's no big deal. But as soon as they told me, hey, you know, sugar fuels the cancer.

Mm-hmm.

I said, all right, I have to— now this will probably give you a little bit of my extremism. I have to cut my connection with sugar. And so I said, well, we could wean myself off of it. But would that work? So I went literally, I was diagnosed on June 13th, 2019. June 15th, 2019, I went on a 3-day water fast.

Wow.

All I had was water for 3 days. And I said, all right, this is going to break my connection with all. And the only reason that I was going to go 5 days, and the only reason we didn't go 5 days is because they, we didn't know when they were going to schedule the surgery. And they were waiting to get a special operating room to do this surgery in. And they could have called me, and I didn't want to be in the middle of the fast and not have my strength with me at the time I went in for surgery.

So we did.

Once we got through 3 days, I said, all right, good. And I never looked back.

Did you feel sick or did you— doing the fast and just cutting out everything like that, did you feel nauseated? Were you cramping your abdomen?

The first 24 hours were really hard. Yeah, I mean, I was taking in water with water with minerals and and and that was it. And but it was it was re it was really hard for the first 24 hours and the cravings and and my wife you know bless her she she decided she says in solidarity I'm going to do it with you and she has she has a bad you know she has she gets bad migraines. Well, within 24 hours, it triggered a migraine for her. And she goes, I'll show my solidarity a different way. But she, at the same time, she has supported every decision that I've made. She's changed how she, how she cooks, how she bakes, everything. And there's never a question. There's never a doubt. And so I think, for me, it was hard, but having a supportive environment. Even going out with my friends, we'll go out to, like you said, chips and salsa. And we'll, we'll go out to a Mexican place. And my friends will say, hey, can you do me a favor? Can we get some carrot sticks and cucumbers with the guacamole? In addition to the chips, they know it, and they support it.

That's so important. That is so important. I mean, when I got sober, it was really hard because I had some friends that really had a hard time. I'm like, look, I'm not telling you that you can't drink. I'm just saying I choose not to. And it was hard at first. And then when you start to feel better, you're like, oh my goodness, thank goodness I wake over— wake up without a hangover and I feel better and I have more energy and more clarity. And so it starts to become easier when you start to see the benefits of doing something that's really for your health in every way. Well, I, I know at that time, thank goodness you had things set up to where you could take time off of work. And that's something that I've kind of learned because we went through our savings like crazy. And I'm like, oh gosh, we have to do something different. Not only that, you know, when I, I was younger, when you're younger and I was like the healthiest I had ever been, I was doing infomercials and I was nationally recognized as a fitness coach. I was feeling pretty indestructible, like I'm going to live forever. And we didn't have anything set up. We didn't have our finances set up. We didn't have a will set up. We didn't have any kind of systems in place. And that's something that you really teach people. And you work with some of the top, I mean, I won't mention names, but I know some of the top people that you work with that you are their, you know, you or their mentor for their business and their finances. And so many people, including me, need help and guidance in just what to do. And I've been thinking about you so much, Mel, because literally right before we started recording, I ran downstairs to get something to drink and my husband was like, well, we found a house in Texas, we're moving.

Oh man.

And I'm like, oh my gosh, I told you. I don't know if I can deal with this just at this moment right now. I've got a lot of events coming up. And, you know, we're going to rent first. We're going to rent our house. And if things, if things go our way, we will actually make profit from renting our house until we decide that we're 100% committed and want to move there. But there's a lot of stuff like with fear that comes up with finances, I think. Yeah. And And partners view finances so differently. I know my husband and I do a lot. So the first question I have for you is, is there some sort of recipe for financial freedom? So if you have some money coming in, instead of just— I was taught growing up, put money in the bank and hopefully you have enough to pay the bills. And it was really a mindset not of abundance. It was like, let's just try to get through the month and pay the bills on time.

Yeah.

I had this mindset of scarcity, like just save all your money, don't invest it. And so I've learned, as I've learned more and going through experiences, that it's about investing the right way. But I wondered if you could share just how— what do we do if we have money coming in? First of all, what do we do with it to make sure that we're putting it in the right place and that we can make money from our money?

You might appreciate this. It's kind of like, because you come from the fitness area, the basic recipe is this. Just like fitness, it's like, if you want to lose weight, eat less, move more type of a thing. The same thing with building wealth. It's living below your means. In other words, 78% of the people are living check to check. So, the first thing we've got to correct is that.

Oh, and I see that so much in LA. It's just—

Oh my gosh.

all about the image and people like having the crazy fancy cars, but then— and traveling, but then having a hard time paying their bills. And I never want to be that way. I had the same old truck that I drove for years, and I was like, I like my truck and I'll get a fancier car when I feel like I can do it with ease and live— still live below my means.

There's a difference between looking wealthy and being wealthy.

Oh, yes.

And I don't care. I don't need the designer stuff. I mean, we have whatever, but I just, I have no reason to display it for anyone to see. I prefer the opposite. In fact, the struggle for me, when I, you know, my book, The Entrepreneur's Solution: The Modern Millionaire's Path, you know, to put, I did not want to put millionaire in the title.

I really fought them.

I fought them. I fought them.

So many people are attracted to that though.

Oh my gosh. But I didn't want to put it out there because I don't know if it was ego, whatever it was. I came from a, a white-collar family, you know. Brendon introduced me to speak on a stage one time, and he turned around and said— he's done so many good things for me. He introduced me and he said, Mel's a multimillionaire. And he put— and so when I come out on stage, he tells them that, uh, in the introduction. He gives me a hug on stage, whispers in my ear, he says, the cat's out of the bag now, you gotta own it. Oh, really?

Oh my gosh, I love Brendon Burchard. He is so amazing.

So, but I think the reality is, is that first off, let's get a handle on, on where things are going, uh, because we can't We can't build wealth if we're hemorrhaging somewhere else, then we got to stop the leaking. We got to stop the digging of the hole first.

Yes.

And part of that might be a lifestyle adjustment. Part of that might be getting a side gig. Part of that might be looking at our income. Part of that might be looking at things. One of the exercises I have people do is I said, I want you to go through your checking accounts. And this might pain people tremendously. Go through your checking account, your credit cards for maybe 6 months. And I want you to mark everything that's a need with an N and everything that's a want with a W.

Wow.

And I said, the thing is that your needs are your survival. They're the clothes, they're the food, they're the shelter, they're the medical, manis and pedis, technology, all that stuff. Those are wants. And in the wants is where you'll find your wealth. being spent out the back door. And if we can plug those holes, then there's this hierarchy that I walk through called the wealth priority ladder that we say, all right, let's now start our path to build that. But if we look at just wealth building in general, because so often people think, oh, this making money and building wealth, it's complicated and it's convoluted.

You know what?

It's not if you just understand the basic principles, but the financial services industry benefit by making sure that you think it's complicated. I'm a CPA by education. I don't sell investments to anyone. So, I have no bias other than bias for you to buy into your dreams and your future and the possibility of being financially independent, which I think is an absolute birthright.

Yeah. And I love that about you, that you really teach people and you can tell you teach from the heart. But you make it fun and you break it down into simple steps. It's like you speak, speak in a way that everybody can understand and it's not complicated. And that's one thing I really love about your podcast is that you get on and you share so many of all of the things that you talk about, about the financial freedom that we can have if we just do these simple steps. But just going through and marking, like Taking a look at your checking, you know, your checking account, your checkbook, your, your credit cards, and marking it with needs and wants is huge because sometimes we don't even realize what we're spending money on. I know that, you know, we're renting this house in Texas and it's a lot of money. I think that a lot of people are moving to Texas and—

Yeah.

The, all the rental properties, they're not so much available, but we wanted to go to an area with a good school district and all of that. And I was like, oh my gosh, we're moving, but we don't even have our house rented out yet. My— I'm like, I just need to make sure that we can float to, you know, a rental and a mortgage. And the whole point of going to Texas is take our stress down, not add to it.

Yeah.

And so I had to look at some of the things that we're cutting out. So like you said, it's like, okay, well, private school, won't have to pay for that every month. boarding our horse for equestrian, won't have to pay that. Well, that will cover our mortgage. So it's like figuring out things like that. But it can be so— it can be scary. It can.

And I think you used the word stress. And I think that's the thing that, you know, people— I hear people— I had a question that came in on the show about this whole idea of, hey, since interest rates are so low, should I borrow money to go invest it. And I'm going, no, think of that. There's a psychological impact of stress, of debt that we don't think about.

Oh, yeah.

Now, I think that there's productive debt and destructive debt and everything, and there's a place and time for it. But we, we can measure the economics of debt, but the stressors of debt? I mean, when you realize I've got this house payment every, every month, Or I have this credit card payment every month or student loan payments every month. That puts stress on a person. It puts stress on a relationship. It puts stress on a family. And if something happens, if life happens like happened to you or happened to me, and we have those levels of debt, that's when that stress gets exaggerated and escalated at a fast rate. Because you're just trying to keep ahead of the game.

And yeah, so I don't want to have to keep ahead of the game. I want to not be behind. You know what, Mel? That's why every month I pay my credit card off. I don't have any credit card debt. I just never— I saw how my, my mom struggled with that, and I thought, I never want to be in that position where I'm struggling every month And so I just, I pay stuff off. I don't want— I want to get rid of any kind of stress. We're always going to have those stressors. We're going to have, you know, rent or mortgage or all that. But it's how do we lower that stress?

One of the key elements, I know people call it an emergency fund. I call it a peace of mind fund. I remember I was picked up by a car service to speak in Montana once. And This was a kid that just finished college and he was the driver. And he said, and he found out what I did. And he said, oh, what would you give a kid coming out of college as far as advice about retirement? And I said, the first thing to stop thinking about is calling it retirement. Because retirement is easy to put off. It's a long ways away. Trust me.

Mm-hmm.

I remember when I was 25 and all of a sudden I just turned 60. I don't know where the time went. Okay, but what we're really—

You look so good for— I can't believe you're 60.

Thank you. Yeah.

You look amazing. So anyway, sorry, go ahead. I just— you're, you're in such great shape. You— it shows that you take care of yourself. It really shows. But so I love that you, you say how you rename things. Don't call it retirement. What would you call it?

I call it peace of mind.

Peace of mind. I love that.

Because we all want peace of mind today. Retirement, we can think about tomorrow. But it's all trying to create peace of mind in the moment. For me, when I was diagnosed, you know, I went to my attorney 2 hours later just to make sure that all things were dialed in. But the reason for that was so I could fight the fight with the peace of mind knowing that my wife's taken care of, my son's taken care of, my brother's taken care of, and everyone that I, I love was taken care of.

Mm-hmm.

And so I was at peace. I knew that whatever little debt we have, she's okay. We don't have to worry about it. And when you, when you can relieve that stress in life, you know, maybe there's some sacrifices in the, in the short term to get you there. But the long-term effect of having peace of mind is far greater, and we want to possess that today. Retirement we put off too, too far.

Oh, I love renaming it that. But I would love for you to talk about how important it is to get things in order. A lot of times people— I mean, I talked to— I, after my accident, I talked to my mom and my dad and said, look, I know this is kind of a not a fun thing to talk about, but it's necessary. And for peace of mind, I need you to set up, you know, contact an attorney and you set up all your things, put all your finances, your will, everything in order so I know what to do. And it will give you peace of mind as well. And so, so many people don't have things in order. What would you suggest they do?

Today, there was these traditional roles, I guess, in the generations gone by. I watched my mom as my dad passed. I watched Stephanie's mom when her dad passed. You know, we're, we're in a, in a committed relationship, you know, marriage or otherwise, typically one person is the driving force behind the money choices and the money decisions and all that stuff. And I think that's fine. But as long as they're under the same roof, as long as they're in the same bed, as long as they're in your life, they need to be part of that conversation. So, I think the first thing, one of the first take or one of the first steps that I tell couples is I said, I need you to have a conversation, a real conversation around money. What's your vision for it? What does it mean to you? What does it look like?

What do you want?

And have those conversations. I don't expect and don't want them all, everyone to become this financial analyst. But Stephanie, when she came into my life, she comes from the medical science side. So she wanted to know more about my medical history than my financial history. But I needed her to know, here's the 3 phone calls you need to make if God forbid something happens to me. That, that her knowing that she's not gonna— like, I remember her mom when her dad— her dad passed away, uh, very all of a sudden. He was— he swam 5 miles. He was a collegiate swimmer. He was swimming 5 miles a day. In the middle of a swim, he had a hemorrhagic stroke.

Oh.

Um, you know, at, at a relatively young age.

He—

it was 2 weeks past his 70 first or 72nd birthday. So it was totally unexpected. And I remember flying back east and, and her mom was downstairs in tears. And she came up to the bedroom. She says, you need to go talk to mom. I said, what's up? She goes, she doesn't know if she can keep the house.

Oh my goodness.

And I go, all right. So we extended our trip a week. We moved some things around. I said, you're fine. You're fine. But Imagine for a moment if she knew that before anything ever happened.

Yeah.

You know, same with my mom. And I think that as much as we don't want to have to talk about— call it end of life, call it, you know, the future, call it retirement, call it whatever you want— life happens. And whether it's a cancer, an accident, a death, or a pandemic, The question you got to ask yourself is, are you prepared when life happens? I think it's important for us to look at it and say, let's have a conversation of what we want life to look like.

Hmm.

And now we can, if we're on the same page of what we want life to look like, we can then have a more tactical conversation of, okay, what do we want to do? What are we willing to do to get there to make that happen? So we, in a sense, create a lifestyle plan that is built on the pillars of finances to make it happen and not the other way around where we say, let me figure out my finances and I'll see what lifestyle. We back into it. We start with lifestyle and say, let me figure out what I need to make.

I love that. Oh my gosh. I just have to ask you though, do you find yourself as kind of a mediator between couples sometimes?

I do. I do. You know, it's funny. When I first started doing this, I started doing this, that's what came out of the cancer. That's what gives the cancer meaning. That's what gives my whole— I see, look back on my whole journey and all the little stumbles and falls and everything that I've done. I go, this is what I was supposed to do.

Yeah.

And, but when I went out to start doing it, I thought, I'm just going to tell you, let me tell you the kind of investment portfolio. Let me tell you that. And I was going to give you tactics. And it didn't take very long for me to realize, if I can't help you navigate the emotions and the psyche, then you're never going to understand or be willing to accept the tactics.

Well, that was actually my next question for you is, how do wealthy people think differently? Do you, do you think there's, there is a different way that they think? Do you think it all starts with our mindset and the way that we view finances?

So there is a commonality. This is really interesting, because I was interviewing a lot of folks through over the, over the months and the couple years trying to prepare for this. And there were everyone from startups, people that were just starting their business, people that were wage earners, to millionaires and billionaires. And the commonality between all of them is they all around money had some level of guilt, shame, and embarrassment for different reasons, but it all existed. It was guilt because I had money. It was guilt because I lost money. It was guilt because I didn't have money. It was shame because I had money. It was for different reasons, but—

Oh my goodness. That just makes so— I see that so much. And You know, I think I was telling you when we talked before, when I first got a nice— my first really nice car, and my husband was like, oh, well, don't post, don't be posting that on Instagram. And first of all, I'm not the kind of person that's like, hey, look at my car, taking a picture with my car. I got the car because it helps me drive, because I don't have to push the pedal with my right foot. But I know the guilt and the shame. Don't look too shiny or don't, you know, don't put on that Gucci belt. You don't want to make too much of a statement. You know what I mean? So that's interesting that that is a common thing that you saw.

Yeah. Yeah. So I think we'll all wrestle with it forever. We'll all wrestle with imposter syndrome. We'll all wrestle with, with am I worthy of it? Um, I wrestle with it constantly. where, where I gotta check myself. And, and so, and typically when that happens, it's because we're living internal versus looking outside and serving and coming from a place of what, what can we do to help? I think the, you know, so that's, that's the first thing is to realize, they may have more commas, they may have more zeros, But they feel the same and they think the same as us. Now, where do they differ? I think where they differ is that they don't see failure as a failure. They see failure as a stepping stone. They see failure as part of the process. And they're always willing to— not always, but those that really grow, are willing to accept their role in whatever failures happen. When I lost, I lost 1/3 of my net worth in a Ponzi scheme in 2005. I mean, into the 7 figures.

I listened to that one episode that you did. I mean, crazy. Do you know we almost invested in a friend of ours that it was a Ponzi scheme? He's in jail.

It's a little tangent, but if there's one advice That I would tell you is what that Ponzi scheme did for me is it gave me rules for investing. And so if I've got a friend that comes to me and say, I've got an investment for you, I do not even want to discuss it. You'll destroy friendships. You'll destroy relationships. I don't care. It might've been the best investment in the world and I may lose out, but I got in the Ponzi scheme because a friend came to me and said, this has been working great. And I got pulled in. I pulled another friend in. Between the 3 of us, we lost $4.5 million.

Oh my goodness. And then I'm sure that you, for bringing another friend in, felt terrible because y'all all lost the money.

Yeah. And so, oh, but I think that it's important for us to— first, if it's too good to be true on the investment side, it's too good to be true.

Yeah.

You don't take on huge returns Without huge risk. Trust your gut. I know that's not technical, but you know what? I didn't listen to the voice in my head. I didn't listen to my gut. I knew because I was a financial guy, I knew that something didn't make sense.

But you were like, oh, I'm going to go for it. But you know what? Your gut never lies.

No. You know what kept me going into it is, and con men and women, I'm putting them both, con people, they understand how to play the emotional And when your emotions go up with your financial decisions, your intellect goes down. And we tend to make bad financial decisions when they're based in emotion. And so, we need to— one of the things, one of the reasons that they created credit cards was not to give you credit. It's to eliminate or reduce the friction in your buying decision. It's so easy these days to just take your phone and scan it and go, here we go, tap the card and I'm out. Or you have your credit card. Or click the button.

Yeah, Amazon, one button, done. It's like, what have I done?

So now you buy stuff and there's boxes showing up at the house, and, and before you know it, you're going, oh man, yeah, I might pay my cards off every month, but I'm still overbuying.

Yeah.

Because there's no friction. And if you don't believe me that you buy more because you're on credit, do me a favor for one week, one week only, pay for everything in cash.

Oh yeah. It's a difference.

See what happens.

Yeah. It's a huge difference. You know, I just, uh, I, I pulled cash out to actually— it's interesting you're saying this. I pulled cash out to do this too. I was like, I need to cut down on my credit card. I'm getting used to it being up a little higher. I'm saying, oh, I'm investing in my business. I need to develop that new website. I say I need it, a lot of things that I don't need. So I pulled cash out and I was at the grocery store and I'm like, you know, this grocery store is really expensive. I love Erewhon, but I could get the same stuff at Trader Joe's for half the price. And it made me realize I am really overspending. It was so easy, but they make you you feel like, oh, you're a member, so you get a 10% discount. Still doesn't bring the cost down to what it should be.

But they know the emotional strings to pull. But imagine this for a moment, and I'll never be the person to tell any of my clients or anyone that, that are listening to, to not buy something. I'll tell you to buy something. You go do what you want to do. I just want to make sure that you're aware, conscious, and intentional. And here's what I mean by that. Let's assume by doing what you did, Amberly, Amberly, that you now save $100 a week that you're not spending. And we take that $100 a week and we put it away into an investment account. Say it earns 8%. The average stock market returns over history is about 8%. It earns 8%. So it's $100 a week, $400 a month. And you do that for the next 30 years. 30 years.

Wow.

Do you know that just that act will turn into $600,000 to $700,000 for you?

Wow. I think so. If you're listening, go run and do that right now. Yeah.

And the thing is that people will say to me, well, I'm not making enough. I can't do it. I'll wait till I make more. I go, great. That's like the person saying, no, I'm gonna wait till I'm 100 pounds overweight instead of 70 pounds overweight to start Working out. Here's the thing. Most people don't have money issues. Their money issues are a symptom of a behavior issue. And so that's why I tell people, if they want to get on the path to wealth, if they want to get on the path to financial freedom, start somewhere. Even if it's $5. When you go to the gym to start working out, you start with the little chrome weights. And, and you start working up. The whole idea is to change your behaviors, and through the behavior change, you'll change your money. And it could simply be $5 a week, it could be $10 a week, it could be $20, whatever you can afford. The behavior is more important than the amount.

Wow. You know what, that's really powerful. That puts people in the driver's seat of their life, but also I think a lot of people think, oh, well, I have to be really wealthy to start investing, you know, and you're saying no, start somewhere. And I love the analogy that you use with it's just like going to the gym. You start with a little weights and you work your way up, but you start somewhere and that gives you peace of mind. Um, well, I, I just— do you have time for like 2 more questions?

I do, I do.

Okay. Oh, thank you so much. Because I mean, I have a million questions, but I know we've got to cut our time short. You talk about having a money machine, like creating a money machine. There's a lot, you know, for so long I was trading time for money. And I remember when I was a fitness trainer and I worked 12, sometimes 14 hours a day. And that was back-to-back hour-long sessions, one person at a time. And all I had— I was trading my service, my time for money. I didn't really have like this money machine. It was like if I was sick or I was out of work, I didn't make money.

Right.

And so what is something you can suggest to anyone out there that wants to just, you know, start making money while they're sleeping, while— so they don't have to trade time for money, that they, even if something happens, you know, if they get COVID, God forbid, or something happens, that they can still be— have some financial liberty, that they can still have like a money machine. Is there a way to do that?

Yeah, it takes, it takes time, it takes discipline, and it takes, uh, a process. So, so the answer is yes. We came up in the industrial age, through the industrial age, and we kept the industrial age thinking. Save, save, save, save, save. You work one job, you work one thing, and they'll take care of you in retirement. Well, that went away in 1981 when they did away with pensions for the most part. Most companies don't have lifetime income. You need to create lifetime income for yourself.

Mm-hmm.

And you can do it in a 401, you can do it in an IRA. It's probably not achievable in an IRA loan because you're limited to $6,000 or $7,000 depending on age, a year type of a thing. But point being is this, whether you're working in a job or you're working in a business, too often people come into business and they become entrepreneurs because they think it's going to give them freedom and they just find themselves trapped. They're like George Jetson on that treadmill.

Yeah.

Oh my God, Jane, get me off this crazy thing. And they can't get off of it and they don't realize But the business isn't there to give you freedom. The business and your job is there to give you cash flow. And then we take that cash flow and use it to build a separate machine out of investments, out of things that can sell without you being there.

Yeah.

Out of real estate that you can flip the switch, it becomes your ATM.

Yes.

If you will. This is what allowed me to move through the cancer is that we had a money machine over on the side that was just building and continuing to build. And when I realized I'm going to pull myself out of it, I said, I'm going to reduce my income in my business by probably 80%. And I told my wealth guy, I said, flip the machine on. Now, the difference was, and I'm going to, and this is no judgment on what you went through, But let's look at what the difference was. Now, you weren't in the position to do that, but I want to urge people to go further. You had savings and you had the money there to take care of you, which is what typically they do with an emergency fund. But what if you had enough there that you didn't drain it, that you could cut a piece of it off that would support you, but that money stayed there? And so when you come through your journey of, of healing, on the other side of that, the machine is still intact.

Yeah. And see, I didn't have a big enough machine. Yeah, I only— the only machine that I had was I had other trainers that worked for me. And so that was a little bit of a machine, but not enough. And especially with the kind of treatments I was having. I mean, we had $2.9 million worth of medical expenses. And we had a lien on our house. I mean, it was insane. And it was a good wake-up call for me. It really shook me up and it changed the way that we do money. And we've created a money machine for us, thankfully. So this time around when COVID happened, it was like I knew I was going to be okay. I had that peace of mind because I had the money machine over here. I want to get a bigger money machine over here and here and here.

That's the thing. I had someone, a friend of mine that I was working with, he sent me a text the other day saying, oh my God, I just put $85,000 into an account and this and that. He says, I'm loving this investing lifestyle. All of a sudden, it becomes a game for you. And that's exactly what I want. What you're doing is exactly what needs to be done. I went through the same thing. I herniated 3 discs in my back. I couldn't work for 6 months. And it was back in the '90s. That lit the light and go, wait a second, I got to have some other way to make money. So, I mean, I had the same catalyst. You know, it wasn't as horrendous as yours for sure. But to allow you to say, wait a second, we got to do something different. And you've been blessed enough to open yourself up to the awareness of that and saying, How am I going to do this differently? So if something happens, and you know what? It's, look, building the machine, you'll need it someday because you're going to retire. You're going to stop. You're going to have grandchildren. You're going to have great-grandchildren. You're going to want to do, you're going to need it someday. But think of it as a seatbelt in the sense of I wear the seatbelt. And if I get home safely, should I look back on it and say, I should have never worn the seatbelt. I didn't need it. Because when you need it, it's too— and you don't have it, it's too late. So I would look at it and say, it's important to look at your job and your business and say, how do I start building something that isn't dependent upon my inputs to drive the outputs? Because when we do that, and that's, that's what takes time.

Yeah.

We've been taught over the years to earn money, and that money we then go and consume with it. We buy with it, we consume it. But what if that money was truly our seeds? And we plant those seeds in the ground, and we take those seeds and allow them to grow. And now each year, all we do is we cut the crop for that year. Live off the crop and allow the crop to regrow every year. That's the way we need to look at our earnings, is that we take a portion of it every year and we use it to build our future. And, and over time, we'll build a large enough machine that we never have to cannibalize it or drain it, and that we can live off of the cash from the machine. That's—

and that you don't Well, in that you don't have to kill yourself working 12, 14, 16, sometimes hour days just on that treadmill killing yourself, that you can live a life with peace of mind and, and fulfillment and not, like you said, just on that treadmill constantly just working, working, working.

How old is your daughter?

My oldest one is 25 and my youngest one is 13. You know what, Mel? My youngest daughter is such an entrepreneur already.

Right.

So she, she wants to buy a new horse to compete with. And I'm like, well, not yet. You were gonna have to sell your other horse if you want that top horse that they're, they're a lot of money. So she starts looking in her room, she finds a website, she starts selling stuff. I just got a text from her right before we started recording. Mom, I've already sold 3 things this morning. And she's just like creating that income. 13. And she's like, okay, what can I sell? How can I make money? Then she comes in my closet last night. Mom, do you have any shoes that you want to sell? I'm like, I don't have any shoes I want to sell. She's like, mom, you don't wear these shoes. You need to sell that. You want me to sell these shoes for you? Like, she's This is hilarious.

This is amazing. I love this because why I asked the question was because this is so important. We can actually change the financial destiny of all our youth if they just understood the principles of compounding and money. My son is 31. His wife's 28. And I started him at 11 years old, understanding and working with him, giving him a commission and He was learning some of this stuff. I didn't know he was learning it. I didn't know if it was going in, but he's 31, 28. They just had their first grandchild. They have 3 homes and a multimillion-dollar net worth already.

Wow.

You take either your 25-year-old or 13-year-old, either one of them, and get them to understand that when they start to put away money. So every dollar you put away today in 20 years is worth almost $90. Almost $90. So just take your 25-year-old. If they put a dollar away today, and at 45 years old, it's worth $90. And if they simply understood that, by the time— and they just consistently put $500 a year away, $1,000 a year away, by the time they hit 35 or 40, they're done. And now the machine grows on its own without all the effort that, that we have to put in because we started later because no one told us.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I wasn't taught that growing up, and it's something that I've had to learn along the way, and it's something that we have taught our kids. In fact, when, you know, Ruby, who's 13, we have it set up when she turns 18, we have put money aside so we will be able to get cash enough to pay for college. But she's smart. She's like, no, Mom, I'm gonna get a scholarship to college. I've worked hard horseback riding, and I'm gonna get a scholarship for equestrian, and I'm gonna go to school. Like, she's already thinking ahead. How can I make this work? So I love to see her think like that.

I just—

Yeah, well, I know that you help So many. You have so many besides your book, your podcast. And y'all, I'm serious, his podcast, I love that you break things down in analogies. It's easy to understand lessons about what you should do with your money. If y'all look and just listen to his podcast, you can find it on Apple or any other podcast. It's called The Affluent Entrepreneur Show. And you have some free resources you've got on your— if y'all look him up on Instagram, MelAbraham9 is your handle, right?

Yep.

Is that your handle? So y'all, yeah, always great tips. He goes live or he does IGTVs on Instagram. The reason I'm sharing all this with you is because I really want you to take an opportunity to learn from him because you give so much and it's from a place of genuine, like you really want people to, to be successful. But you also have a free money challenge, free money plan challenge. Is that what it's called?

Yeah, it's, it's a money plan workshop. It's a 7-day training that people go through that help get their mind straight, their debt straight, their money straight. And kind of, here's the thing, if we're going to create an unshakable foundation for our financial destiny, we need to have a good plan in place. And so I just wanted people to kind of go through and say, take this stuff, go do it, make it happen.

Is this something like my 13-year-old could do?

Yeah, it is. I mean, some of it may not apply to her because she probably doesn't have debt, but—

Okay.

But, but yeah, no, she doesn't have debt. Yeah, one of the trainings, but she'll understand the— what debt can do. And now And she's already possibly seeing that because, you know, if she's thinking about, I'm going to get a scholarship, I mean, we got $1.7 trillion in student loan debt. These kids are coming out of college. They signed on the dotted line at 18 years old without understanding the dynamics of what they were getting into. And when they're coming out of college, the day they're supposed to say, go soar, go have your dreams. Oh, wait a second. Let me strap this albatross around your neck. Now try and soar.

Yeah.

Yeah, it is less their fault and more the financial aid office's fault for, for putting this kind of drug in front of people. Yeah, I'm opinionated about it for sure. But I just don't want to see our youth struggle because they didn't understand or they weren't fully informed of what they were getting into. And there's other ways to pay for college.

Yeah. Now, this is kind of off topic. But do you believe in Going to college?

Yeah. So, I do. So, my son who started his business at age 16, he's had his business since then, but he was in his final year and a half of college. And I was out speaking and I got a text from him saying, yeah, Dad, I don't think this college thing is really helping me any. So, I'm thinking of quitting. And, you know, I'm like, so I sent him a text. I said, we'll deal with it when I get home. And I basically said to him, I said, here's the deal. It's an adult decision and you get to make it. And I'll support it 100%. But you don't get to adult halfway. You get to adult all the way. So if you choose to get out of college and stay in your business and do that, that's fine. That means you pay for your car fully, because I was paying half of it, rent and all that. Just do the math. I mean, you just got to live your life like an adult.

Yeah.

He came back to me and says, you know, a year and a half isn't so bad. Now, here's why I think it's important, especially— and this may sound judgmental to the kids today or the youth today, and I can say kids today because I'm 60 now— um, they, uh, is that, um, I think it's important for them to start something big and finish something big.

I agree.

And even if the— if, if there's stuff that I learned in college that I never But starting something big and finishing something big and not giving up and going through the trials, going through the adversity, getting through it and, and figuring out the discipline of studying all that, I think is an important life skill. And so yeah, I believe in it. If, if not for the education, for that. And so exactly, I am a believer in it.

Yeah, I do too. And you know, it's just like with Um, my daughter's school, it's— she's like, would— it was so hard. She would cry every day, and I'd drop her off and she'd say, do you hate me? Is that why you're making me go to this school? There's— I, I hate this school. Do you hate me, Mom? Is that what you're doing? And I'm like, look, we signed you up. This is a really great school. We signed you up. You have to at least— if, if it's this bad Maybe we'll look into other schools, but you have to finish the year. And you know what? She ended up loving the school. Now she loves it. But now she's like ready to go to Texas. I think she's ready to have a horse in her backyard. And I don't know, we'll see. I'll keep you posted on that.

Yeah.

I'm excited that we're speaking at an event. By the time this podcast comes out, it will probably— the event will probably already have happened or maybe just happened. But I am so honored I get to be on a panel with you because I really admire Not just the person you are and all you've overcome, but how much you share with others so that they can really learn about how to do the best. You know, everybody needs help learning with what to do with their finances and creating their money machine. And just to have somebody like you that we can trust, it means so much. So I'm so excited to see you in North Carolina in person. And, um, y'all please check him out if you're out for a run or something listening to this. Or you're watching on YouTube right now, the everything, his show notes, where the free money plan challenge—

Go to moneyplanworkshop.com. Money plan, the money plan, the moneyplanworkshop.com.

Okay. And all his Instagram, his website, his podcast, his book, all that's in the show notes. So make sure you check that out and check Mel out. Thank you so much for For all that you've shared. Oh my goodness, I love talking with you, and I appreciate you going over a little bit too. So—

Anytime, anytime. This was a gift to me. This is the joy, and this is, uh, me doing what I'm meant to do.

Thank you. And where would you like people to reach out to you? I know that you answer a lot of questions on your podcast. If somebody has a question or they want to reach out, what's the best way to reach out to you?

They can DM me on Instagram if they want. Instagram or Facebook, but Instagram, probably the best place to DM me. And if they have questions, post them. I'll bring the questions on the show. We'll answer them and keep them moving forward. There's no reason to flounder financially.

Yeah. Thank you. And I love that you answer questions on your podcast because they're all questions that a lot of us want to ask and we get to learn through other people's questions and how you answer. So thank you so much for being here. And I'm excited to see you in North Carolina.

We're gonna see each other soon. Thank you, Amberly. If anything comes up, you let me know.

I will. Thank you.

All right.

Thanks so much for joining us this week on True Grit and Grace Podcast. If you like it, please rate it or share it with your friends. That would help too. If you're not yet on the newsletter list, come over to Amberly Go to amberlylago.com and jump on it. While you're there, you can grab a free downloadable gratitude journal, and you might just want to check out my book or even check out my monthly motivational membership. Thanks again for tuning in, and we'll see you next week. Bye.