In this Bloomberg‑produced interview on the Your Money Story podcast, host Renita Young talks with money‑mindset coach and author Ash Cash (Ash Exantus) about how a mindset of abundance transforms financial outcomes. Ash shares his personal journey from a troubled youth in a single‑parent household to becoming a VP at a global bank and a bestselling author. He explains that true wealth comes from shifting from “working hard for money” to making money work for you by acquiring income‑producing assets such as royalties, rental properties, dividends, and business equity. He introduces the core principle “don’t do, be,” urging listeners to embody the identity and habits of the wealth they desire rather than merely performing actions. Ash also stresses the importance of planning for one’s ideal life, visualizing the desired lifestyle, and reverse‑engineering the financial requirements, rather than limiting plans to current circumstances. The conversation wraps with a brief overview of his podcast Inside the Vault, which interviews high‑achieving individuals to extract a “wealth‑consciousness blueprint.” Throughout, Ash emphasizes abundance as a birthright, the power of mindset, and practical steps listeners can take to rewire their relationship with money.
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Hey everybody, and welcome to Your Money Story. I'm your host, Renita Young, and welcome to Friday. Listen, this is actually the last day we'll be on for a Friday. Next week we move to Wednesdays at 10:30 Eastern, so make sure you tune in next Wednesday at 10:30 Eastern for our next show. Now listen, what I have not been able to get off of my mind lately is the mindset behind money, and so today we're going to talk about having a mindset of abundance when it comes to managing your money. So to do that, I'm gonna bring on Ash Cash. Now, he is an award-winning, 4-time bestselling author. His most recent book is From the Block to the Bank. He's also the host of the Inside the Vault show and the founder of Mind Right Money.
So let's grab Ash, how you doing?
Doing well, doing well.
Happy Friday. Of course I had to have you on because you're all about Mind Right Money, having a good mindset. You are a money mindset coach. So let's talk about this. You know, one of the things we start out with on Your Money Story is just that, your money story. And so a few quick points for everyone who hasn't met Ash yet. By 24, he was VP of a global financial institution. He was also ranked 112 in the nation out of what, 100,000 bankers? And now everyone knows him as Ash Cash. But listen, take us back to growing up out in the Northeast. And you have a story where you were kicked out of school, you were expelled. Walk us through that first.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, growing up, typical urban story, you know, growing up single-parent home. I'm the youngest of 3. My mom raised us by herself. I mean, the hood raised us too, you know. And so, I got in trouble, kicked out of school 4 times, 1st grade, 5th grade, 9th grade, expelled out the 10th grade. You know, got in a lot of trouble, but really was just kind of following what everyone was saying, that I would be dead or in jail by the age of 25. Until I had that mindset shift and realized that I could do better than that. I got exposed to a different life. I got an opportunity to be a banker at 19 and the rest is history. I, you know, I was a CEO at 31 years old. I have done everything in banking from teller to personal banker to private banker to branch manager to CEO and now live a great life teaching people how to change their minds in order to manage their money better.
Excellent. And so during that process, you actually chronicle this process in your new book, From the Block to the Bank. Full— the full topic is how to make the most of your circumstances and maximize your full potential. So what can people expect to learn from your book?
Yeah, I think, you know, for me, the inspiration around writing the book was because a lot of people see my success now, They see a popular podcast, they see a best-selling author of 10 books, they see all this stuff, but they don't really know that, you know, I didn't grow up in Parsippany, New Jersey. No disrespect to Parsippany, but you know what I'm saying, I grew up in the hood.
Yeah.
And so, I think that a lot of times people see the end result but don't know what you've been through. And so, people can expect to hear a real story, a raw story, a story of some ups and downs, some wins, some losses. But they'll also learn that regardless of your circumstance, regardless of what happens, regardless what your background is, regardless of, you know, the things that happen in your life, as long as you stay focused, you're intentional, as long as you understand that the good, the bad, and the ugly are all working for your greater good, and if you don't give up, you can live your best life. And that's what I intend— I want my intention for the book and people to read it will get from it.
Right. And so, when you were growing up, what was your relationship with money like?
Yeah. So, it's funny because even as a banker, my relationship with money was that I had to work hard for it. You know, because that's all I saw my mom. My mom worked the factory job. She worked really, really hard. I've been an entrepreneur since 8 years old packing bags at the local supermarket, selling t-shirts as a vendor. So, my relationship with money was that I had to work hard for it until I started working with wealthy individuals and they didn't work hard, right?
Mm-hmm.
They used their mind to create money and once they created money, they learned how to change that relationship and allow money to work hard for them. And I said, ah, there we go. And so, it was really a lot of thinking stuff that allowed a lot of, you know, people to build true wealth. And that's why, you know, I teach it now because A lot of us, because we didn't have money, we just make this assumption. You don't have money, work hard for it. But that's the opposite. You'll actually chase money away if you work hard for it.
That's actually one of your first topics, or not just topics, but that's one of your first tips for managing your money from the mindset of abundance. But what does that practically look like to understand that your money works for you? We're talking about compounding interest? Are we talking about investing more aggressively earlier?
Yeah, yeah, so it's really just, you know, making sure that you're not ending the cycle of money, right? And so a lot of people say, I'mma spend money. What is the last 3 letters of spend? It is ending it, right? And so what happens is that you spend money, you make money, you spend it, you end the cycle. Now you have to work hard again to gain money and you keep doing that cycle over and over again, which means if you don't work, you don't get paid or you don't have money. The goal is when you work hard for money, if you don't come from money, you create the money. But now, instead of buying things with the money, buy some income-producing assets.
Okay.
And let the assets be the thing that continues to buy things. And then now, if you decide to work hard again, You now buy income-producing assets and then you keep building your assets. So now your assets are what you live off of. And so some examples of assets, right? I'm an author. I've written 10 books. My first book came out 2009. To this day, I still get paid every single month for something I did 12 years ago, right? Real estate. People usually buy their first home to live in. What if you bought your first home and you rented it out? You bought a duplex, a multifamily.
Mm-hmm.
And you allow the rent to, you know, to pay you. That's another form. Investing your money in the stock market that gets dividends, that's another form. Start, you know, investing in a business. Not working in a business. If you work in a business, you could potentially, you know, keep the same cycle. But if you invested in a business and you allow, you know, the business to grow and the money you get from the business kind of work, you know. So, there's so many different— I can give you tons of examples.
Yeah.
But the premise is work hard, Make money, take that money, buy an income-producing asset, let the income-producing asset be the thing that buys the things.
Absolutely. Be the thing that buys the things. I love that. And so, the next thing you talk about when it comes to managing your money from the mindset of abundance is don't do, be. Listen, explain that because I heard you talk about it a couple of days ago.
That's heavy because a lot of people think that in order to get, they have to do, right. So, we're so busy doing, doing, doing, chasing these things when the truth of the matter is that if we want true abundance, right, abundance is your birthright. If you want true abundance, you have to be in a state of being, right. What do I mean? In order— like, when you wake up, you already know what you love, you already know who you are, you already know what you were put here to do. what you were put here to be, but a lot of people are not being that because they're too busy doing. And so if you want— prime example, if you desire to be a millionaire, then be a millionaire, right? What does that mean, Ash? How do you mean be a millionaire? Because the truth of the matter is that a millionaire is not what you have in your bank account. It is actually a state of being, right? And so you take a somebody who's poor, who has a poverty mindset, and you give them a million dollars, they will give that million dollars right back because they are not a millionaire. They are— they have a poverty mindset. And so if you want to be a millionaire, just be a millionaire. Know what a millionaire does. Know what the habits of the millionaire is. You know, be around the people that millionaires are around. And as you start walking in that being, then, you know, the universe and God will now allow that being to come to you. So, you know, you want success, be success. You want blessings, be a blessing, right?
Mm-hmm.
You want a promotion, be that position, right? Not do the position because when you do it, it is an action. But when you embody something with your being, right? Like, I don't do motivation, I don't do inspiration, I am motivation, I am inspiration, I am abundance, right? And so, okay, when I practice that I am, you could feel it. I don't even got— you could just go on my aura. I'm sorry, I'm getting excited.
I'm sorry, you get me excited. I love it.
You get me excited.
Listen, people in the comments love it too, all right? You have the Amen Corner telling you talk king. You have people going, this dude is very real. Um, I really love it. I'm loving the comments. And so the last thing that I want to ask you about is, um, you say that it's very important to have a plan. This is something that comes up often with the people who I talk to.
Yeah.
And so if you're a person who maybe you don't know who you are yet, you know, um, and you don't have a plan, like, what can you do just to start creating a plan? I heard something cool that you said a couple of days ago on your live that, um, You really should start kind of dreaming out loud or maybe even write down where you want to be.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, a lot of people make a big mistake and plan for their current situation, right? And I think it's the biggest mistake you can ever make because, you know, the universe only says yes and you are co-creator. And so, whatever you create with your mind is what's going to happen. And so, a lot of people say, you know what, this is my current situation. So, I'm going to plan for that current situation, I'm going to create that, right.
Mm-hmm.
And so, at the end of the day, what you're doing is you're limiting your lifestyle, you're limiting your life, you're limiting what is possible because there's infinite possibilities in your life. Because again, abundance is your birthright. And so, I would tell anybody who's in that planning phase to make sure that you're planning for your ideal life, right. When you plan for your ideal life, what that means is what do you desire your life to look like right now? What does it take for you to have that life? You know, how much does it cost? You know, what— who are the people in it? You know, you really got to embody that. And what happens when you start to plan that thing, you start to visualize, right? You start to visualize what it's going to take.
Yeah.
You might have to go online and research how much the house costs and things of that nature. So now, instead of budgeting for $2,000, Maybe you're budgeting for $10,000. And as you're budgeting for $10,000, now you're asking yourself, who do I have to be in order to command— not what I got to do, but who do I have to be? But you have to have that, you have to know that number. So, knowing that number and then work backwards into your being will get you the life that you want to live.
Love that. You got to reverse engineer it, you know. And it's— and I took that advice. I took that advice the other day. I hadn't done this in a long time, like dreamed out loud. But I wrote down different areas of my life and what I want to see. Like, I just— I went all out, Ash.
Yes.
I went all out to the kind of house I want, what I want in the basement, what the kind of marriage that I desire. And it really is something that not only inspires you, but it helps you in the tough moments of the day to know that this is not— this is not forever. And it helps you naturally gravitate towards solutions, thoughts, mindsets. The small actions, right, that can impact, you know, this huge reaction someday. So, it's a very powerful thing to do, right? And so, this is actually the last question. I need to know about Inside the Vault. Many people in here, they haven't seen it yet. Give me like your 35-40 second overview of what people can watch on Inside the Vault.
Yeah. So, Inside the Vault is the greatest money mindset show on the planet. And what we do inside the vault, it's a metaphor, right? In the bank, you keep your most valuable assets inside the vault in the bank. And we tap into the mindset because your mind is the most valuable asset that you have.
Mm-hmm.
And so, we talk to multi-millionaires, entrepreneurs, you know, athletes, celebrities, everybody who has a level of success and we go inside their vault so we can give you the blueprint to to wealth consciousness, right? Because I talked earlier, you can't— if you give wealth principles to somebody who has a poor mindset, it will never blossom. So, you need to change that wealth consciousness. And so, we give you the blueprint to wealth consciousness. We take you inside the vault of those who are super duper successful and we give you a play-by-play action on how they got there and what you could do to kind of implement that in your life and create that wealth abundance for yourself as well.
All right, Ash Cash, thank you so much for joining folks. If you want to learn more about Ash Cash, head on over to his IG at I Am Ash Cash. And if you want to learn more about his new book, From the Block to the Bank, you can go to wherefromtheblocktobank.com.
Yes, ma'am.
Um, and you can find out about all the other, uh, great things that Ash Cash has going on there, folks. This has been Your Money Story. Thank you so much for joining us and have a lovely weekend, everybody.
