Life Lessons I Wish I Knew Earlier - Here's what matters most

Hey there, real quick before we jump into the episode, listen, if your earnings treadmill hasn't set you free yet, running faster won't either. Listen, hustle without principles just going to burn you out. So here's what I want for you. I want you to join me for my money machine experience. Live it is three free trainings. Deep dive into how to escape the treadmill and build a money machine that actually works for you. All right, grab your spot here by going to moneymachinelive.com and I'll see you in the free training. Listen, if you'd asked me 20 years ago where I would be today, I probably would have said, hopefully rich. But hiding behind a spreadsheet. Yeah, see, I'm a calculator guy, not a conversation guy. Yet at the same time, here I am sitting, having conversations with you, doing the things that I do. You never think about what kind of journey you're gonna. You're gonna be on. And the fact is that I've survived cancer twice. I've raised my son as a single full time dad. I built a business. I lost it. I had to build it back again. And sometimes I had to use duct tape. Sometimes I had to use prayers. Sometimes I don't know how I got through it. And life's kind of funny that way because it doesn't send you a calendar invite to your. Your future. It doesn't tell you what the breakdowns are going to be. It doesn't tell you what the breakthroughs are gonna. Gonna come from. And. But dang it, it's. It's these moments that I think really teach us a lot. So today I actually want to share with you some of the life lessons, the things that I wish I knew. Not just about money, but about life, about the things that I've learned, the mistakes, the meaning of, and the things that I think really matter. And so if you're ready for that, let's do this.

All right, so this is a different episode. Like I said, I want to have a conversation around life, around money. But yes, life. Because here's what we know. Money isn't the end. All money is. It's the paintbrush that we use to paint the masterpiece called our life. And sometimes we don't know what that masterpiece is going to be like. I certainly didn't expect to be here. I didn't expect to be doing what I'm doing. I. I went to school to be an accountant, a numbers nerd, doing the things that I'm doing. And here I am. Yeah, I'M doing numbers. But really it's, it's, it's, it's really talking about life. It's talking about how do we build a life that is free and that doesn't mean that it's linear. I have been blessed with a journey, but I've also been blessed with the mistakes. I've been blessed with the trials. I've been blessed with the challenges. I've been blessed with the losses. I've been blessed with cancer. Yeah, I mean, I think that it's a blessing in hindsight and sometimes we just don't, don't think about it. Now it got me thinking about this because I just recently had a conversation with someone that I hadn't spoken to in a while and last time I spoke to them, they were healthy. Last time I spoke to them they were doing well. And now they're not. Like life turned on them in a moment and they're challenged health wise. They're fighting like crazy. I don't know whether they make it or they don't make it.

But the questions that come up around life, around am I living fully. I think that we need to challenge ourselves with those. I think we need to think about those in a different way. It's so easy to get caught up in the, in the media and the media hype and the vitriol and all of that stuff. But are you caught up in your life? So I hope that I'm going to give you 10 life lessons. I think that matter, the things that I wish I knew earlier and what I think will matter in your life that will make your bank account better, but it's going to make your life account richer and that's what we want. And I think the first thing is this, is to realize that money isn't everything, but it touches everything. It. You know, I used to think of money as the finish line. I used to look at it. I had this, this finish line, this account, this number that I wanted. And I thought that that's, that's the goal. But it wasn't the goal because when I hit that number, it was empty. I hit the number and I go, what does that, what does that matter? You know, it's, do I just change it? Do I, do I just move the line? What do I do next? Because here's what I realized. Having the idea of the number is just the ticket to start the race and it's not the reason that we, we want the number. It's, it's not the number that we really want. It's what we can use that number for. And that's the key. Is that because I hit my financial goals and then I still felt like a fancy ghost. Yeah, I had, I had the trappings, I had the things. Everything looked good but didn't feel good. And so I think that that first lesson is to understand that money matters, but only when it funds your values, Only when it funds your joys, only when it funds the meaning, the things that matter, not when it funds your ego. So that's, that's the first thing, I think the second thing is, is this idea of you can build from nothing, even if it's twice. All right, so. And some of you have heard this. Listen, the first time I, I built my wealth, I had, I was on a trajectory. I was doing really well. I was well ahead of the game. I had.

A multi million dollar net worth. And I got involved in a investment that turned out to be a Ponzi scheme. But here I was getting into things and everything was growing. I thought I was bulletproof. I thought that nothing could harm me. And. And then all of a sudden, this Ponzi scheme comes along and wipes out one third of everything, literally. Me and two other friends, we lost over four and a half million dollars. And look, losing everything.

Not gonna lie, it sucked.

I was resentful, I was worried, I was embarrassed. I felt guilty. I felt like, what did I do? I'm a financial guy. How did I end up here? It should have never happened to me. But it wasn't until someone said, hey.

You did it once. All they took from you was your money, didn't take from you your skills. They didn't take from you the things that got you here. And he says, here's the bigger lesson. Your son's watching you. The question is, what lesson is he going to see in the adversity of things? Going, going, not my way. Am I going to curl up in a ball in the corner when adversity hits and hope the storm passes? Or am I going to get up and do something about it? And I think that maybe you're in that same situation and maybe you didn't. You find yourself in a place where this isn't where you want to be, this isn't what you expected. Maybe failure wasn't the thing you anticipated. No one ever does.

But it's not a terminal thing. And I finally said, I can't let him see me curl up in a ball because then that's the way he would live his life when adversity hit and So I had to get up. I had to look at it and say, what did I learn? What are the things that I can do differently? How did this happen? What are the lessons I can take away? What are the things that I did to get involved in this? In fact, I look at and say, I am responsible. Yes, the person was a thief. He was a parasite. He did it to a lot of people. A lot of people lost their livelihood. But I had to take responsibility for my role in it. And once I did, and I found the lessons in it, I was able to get up, I was able to rebuild. And not only did I recover what was lost, I tripled it in 18 months. And I think that too often we think that failure is the end point, but failure is just the tuition. It's painful, it's pricey, trust me. But it sticks. The lessons stick. The things that I teach today, the things that I do today, the things that allow me to build the wealth for my clients and for myself came from the lessons from there. So indirectly, I had to look at it and say, this is what I had to go through to be here today. Okay, leads me to number three. Thing number three is health is the real wealth. Listen, we get told all the time that we have got.

A limited time here on Earth. I don't think we take it seriously. I know I didn't. I looked at it and said, huh, you know, that, that'll come one day.

But I was 59 when they found that tumor. I was 59 when I heard the words, you have cancer. No one in my family ever had cancer. I was a smoker. I wasn't a drinker. I never imagined. I mean, certainly we had our stuff, you know, heart disease and diabetes and all that stuff. That stuff. I was worried about cancer. It wasn't even a thought in my mind. But here's the thing. Cancer, health issues, they don't care how busy you are.

It just drops in. There's no rsvp. There's nothing. It changes everything. I mean, in that moment, everything shifted. Everything changed. The perspective of the fact that. That we only have a certain number of slices of life became real. The reality is that I hope that those slices are many, that they're. That they're thousands of slices of life, but we don't know. So the real question, and the only thing that I realize is that.

How do you spend the slices of your life? Each slice matters, and that's what it taught me is that. Is that we need to look at it through, through those eyes.

This is why we want the finances. This is why we want the account, so we can live a life of choice.

And not be put in demands. I was blessed. I was blessed because I was in a financial position to pick my doctors. I was in a financial position to shut down my businesses. I was in a financial position because I built the money machine that I talk about that allowed me to say, I have to focus on me to beat this demon, to do the things. Now, maybe for you it isn't cancer. Maybe for you it's your grandchildren. Maybe for you it's a mission, it's a cause. But it needs to be that necessity to make that happen. Because when you do, things shift. That's the reason we need the financial freedom. But it allowed me to have that choice in life.

And to focus on healing, focus on my health and rebuild it. Okay? And I think that, that when we start to understand the idea and the ideals of building wealth and building that richness in life, having health has to be at the forefront. Because it doesn't do us any good to have the big bank account and a horrible health account without our health, we don't have the capacity to enjoy it. We don't have the ability. So we have choice. But if we can't do the things we want to choose to do the things, then it doesn't really make sense to do that. And so you can't hustle your way out of burnout or bad health or, or health choices.

Health is your real bank account and I think that we need to put deposits in it each and every day. One of the biggest things that I do with my guy friends, because I know you all guys out there, you don't like going to doctors, get checked, be proactive. I am so proactive with my health. Part of it is because I look at it and say, my wife hasn't served enough time to get out that quickly, so I gotta stick around for a lot longer. Plus I have two beautiful granddaughters I want to stick around for too. So that leads me to number four, Relationships. They're the true currency. See, I talk about wealth, but more importantly, I talk about richness. And the richness in life is how you experience life. The richness in life is how you share it and who you share it with. The richness in life is the memories and the moments you put together, not the money. See, being a single full time dad, raising Jeremy from six years old.

It wasn't in the cards for me. I didn't know this and there wasn't A manual. And there certainly wasn't a brochure or anything that.

Told me what to do. But what it came with is chaos. What it came with is cafeteria pizza. What it came with is a crash course in dad hacks. What it came with is a six year old boy drawing a picture of me showing a mirror into my soul that I was screwing it up. The fact that I was working all the time, that I wasn't there for him and I wasn't present.

Until I was, thank God he drew the picture of me at 6 years old because it was a wake up call for me to realize that prophets matter. But to him, my presence, man, and more. And what we need to look at is start to ask ourselves, how are we living each and every day when we sit with our spouse? When you sit with your children, are you present? Are you with them? Is there a relationship there? Are there memories there? Can you laugh about it? One of the cherished times I have is every afternoon taking the walk with my dogs and my wife. It's just us having a conversation, creating moments. I think relationships are our true currency. Legacy doesn't live in the LinkedIn bio. It doesn't. It lives at the dinner table. It lives in the moments that we interact. All right, leads me to number five, living life fully expressed. And I get it, we have come through a time where, gosh, expressing what you feel and what you is frowned upon. But I think we need to live fully. We're not here to.

Live half of our life. We want to get to those last days of our life and know that we fully expressed ourselves, that this is us, this is who we are. And you know, it's the only way that we can walk through life without wearing a mask. I know for me, for a while I wore a mask. I was buttoned up, I was polished, I was professional. I had the coat and tie. I had in fact a three piece suit. And I was miserable because it wasn't me, it wasn't me. I didn't enjoy it. I didn't enjoy being behind the desk. I didn't enjoy the things that I was doing. And finally, at some point, I finally traded in the mask for a microphone, a mask for a stage to serve, a mask where I could show up as me dad jokes, corny jokes, pranks, you know, all of it fully, fully lived that I don't leave anything on, on the field. The truth is.

That your truth is your superpower. And yes, it pairs well with whatever it is you, you want to do, whether it's I'm going business casual. I'm going to go serve. Whatever you are put here to do, this is what you're meant to do. And. And I think that you need to live authentically into your truth, who you are, who you're meant to be, whatever that yearning is, because you're meant to live your life. I was meant to live my life. You're not meant to live my life. And I think that's the thing. That's one of the biggest things I tried to teach my son. And he's doing it to just live his life, live his dreams. Why do we do what we do? Building the money machine so you can live your dreams fully expressed. All right, that leads me to number six. Legacy is built daily. I. This is crazy, because I hear people all the time, they say, oh, I want to leave a legacy. No, you don't. I mean, you mean you want to leave stuff. That's what. When they say that, they say they want to leave stuff. Stuff isn't a legacy. Stuff is stuff. The true legacy is. Is something that you do each and every moment. It's not a someday thing. It's not something that you build. And then the legacy becomes. It's something you become. And the legacy is. I look at this and say, it's not really the grand gestures. It's not the big things. It's the small things. It's the interaction with the person behind the register, with the hostess at a restaurant. It's the interaction with your spouse. It's the interaction with your kids, with your peers, with your employees, with you. Legacy is created in the moment. It's about consistent, unglamorous love in motion. And when you do that, you get to live a legacy each day. And it's just who you are and whatever's left behind, deeply enmeshed and entrenched in the people you served, the people you touched. It's not the stuff that you left on the shelf or the real estate or in the bank account. Leads me to number seven. Embrace failure as a stepping stone. Oh, I have had plenty of failures. I failed so many times. I think my ego's got frequent fire miles when you do that. But here's the deal. Failure sharpens you. We actually need it. It's like the resistance training at the gym. You put resistance against the muscle, and the muscle grows. That failure, if we don't allow it to define us, becomes the resistance against the muscle that allows us to grow. It sharpens us. It also humbles us. But when you let will Transform you. When you guide it, it will transform you for good. I don't think you should run failure. So to me it's don't run for failure. Just know that that's where the next version of you lies. That leads me to number eight. I was guilty of this a lot. And that is the idea of busyness doesn't mean progress. We think that, that as long as I'm busy. But I mean, how many times have you got through a day? And you say, God, that was a busy day, but I don't know what I got done.

There's a time that I glorified hustle. You know, working 10, 12 hour days, team no sleep. That was me. That was me. I did it. And while I was stress crying into a third or fourth cup of coffee, I mean, that was not the way to live. And eventually I realized that.

Movement without direction is just noise. It's just noise. Or if you're moving a lot, it's cardio. But, but the fact is this here's, here's the lesson is I think it's time for us to slow down or life will slow you down. Yeah, that's cancer slowed me down.

I herniated three discs in my back. Slowed me down. Listen, when the messages come to you and you don't listen, they're just going to get louder until you do. So the fact is, is that.

Are you making progress? Are you just being busy? And that leads me to number nine and, and, and number nine. Number nine is really about where does freedom come from? It comes from ownership, not escape. I want you to live a life. I want you to create the life that you do not want to escape from. That. It isn't about escaping what you do.

Freedom is about owning who you are. I used to think freedom was sipping drinks on a beach. I thought it was, you know, being in the Caribbean. But true freedom, it's just knowing that life runs without you needing to sprint constantly.

Hey.

And I look at it and I realized until I put.

Systems and structure and stewardship in my life, I know, not sexy, but dang it, it works.

Freedom is built. It's not found. It's created each day. And it wears work boots, it wears.

Work clothes, it wears effort. It's not just flip flops.

And sipping drinks on the beach. It's something bigger. Freedom will come from your structure. Freedom will come from your stewardship. Freedom will come by building systems that allow you to be free by choice. Okay, and that leads me to the last one. And this last one is this idea of, you don't need to be ready, you just need to be willing. Okay. So many times I wasn't ready to do the things that I thought I was going to do. Okay? I mean, even my first live event, I had a dear, dear friend of mine say, hey, why don't you put something on the calendar? I said, I don't want to do a live event. He said, just put it on the calendar. It'll change the way you look at things and the way you show up. You don't have to do the event. I said, okay. So I put it on the calendar. And then he asked me, next time I saw him, is it on the calendar? And I said, yes. He says, what are the dates? I said, June 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. I still remember the dates. And he says, great. He says, you're coming to my event six weeks before, and we're selling your event. So, like, he. He backed me into the corner. I wasn't ready, but somehow I was willing. See, everything great and all the great things that I've done, I don't know that I ever felt ready for them. But I said yes to them anyways. And I figured it out on the way. You don't need to be ready for everything. You don't need to have all the answers. You just got to be willing to go through it. Because that's how growth works. It's clumsy, it's awkward. It's worth it. So readiness is optional. Willingness. That's your ticket in. Let's get it done. Listen, here's the truth. No matter what it is, you don't have to have a perfect plan. You don't have to have all the answers. You just need to make a decision. A decision about how you want to live your life. A nudge in the direction that you want to go. A focus on the values and the things that you value, the things that really bring richness into your life. And know that in each moment, you can make that decision. Each moment you can take that step. And each moment, it may not feel good, but when it is progressing you in the way that you want to progress, it's the right thing to do. So I hope that if you think about this and you look at your life, you'll take a chance time to look at it and say that this is your sign. This is your sign. This is your permission, this is whatever it is, to step fully into who you are, to know that no matter how much time you have left and hope it's a lot that you're going to live it fully based on you, that you're going to do it your way, that you're going to do it as an example for those that follow, as an example that those are standing by your side and as the definition of who you are, living each moment as your legacy and making each moment matter. I hope this helps. I know that this was different than some of my other episodes, but I think that when we detach money and we only talk about the money and we don't talk about life, we lose the true value of the wealth. And I don't ever want to do that. I don't ever want you to do that. And so focus on the richness in your life and let's get you there. You don't have to do this alone. That's why I'm here and I want to guide you in the process. Listen, if I made the mistakes, there's no reason you need to make them, too. Might as well learn from mine. All right. Until I get a chance to see you in another episode on on your journey on your path to financial freedom. As I say, always, always, always strive to live a life that outlives you. See you next one. Cheers.

Thank you for listening to the affluent entrepreneur show with me, your host, Mel Abraham. If you want to achieve financial liberation to create an affluent lifestyle, join me in the affluent entrepreneur Facebook group now by going to melabraham.com and I'll see you there.

And that's it for this episode of building your money machine where we help you learn how to master your money, eliminate financial stress, and live a life of choice. If you found this valuable or helpful to you, here's what I'd love for you to do. If you do me a favor, go to Apple, Apple podcast, or wherever you're listening to this podcast and rate and review the show. It helps us tremendously to keep us at the top of the list so we can continue to get this information and this message out to people. Because I truly believe that financial freedom is your birthright and I want to help each and every one of you claim it. Thanks so much.