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The object of life is not to be on the side of the masses, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane. — Marcus Aurelius
it operates under an asymmetric scale—those with jobs operate under a linear scale.
Your pursuit of wealth stalls when your focus is on the road and its destination and not the road trip.
You can’t crack wealth’s code with one variable in a multi-variable equation.
Wealth eludes most people because they are preoccupied with events while disregarding process. Without process, there is no event.
mirage of event over process.
When you are granted gifts without any effort, you effectively handicap process.
outcomes of your financial roadmap and the actions and beliefs evolving from that roadmap.
It takes no courage to be normal. No courage to take the road most traveled. No courage to sit comfortably within the walls of your culture. Courage comes questioning, and then challenging the expected. — MJ DeMarco
The Sidewalk’s siren song is instant gratification which can come from many addictive sources:
There is little hope for Sidewalkers because their roadmap is corrupted by gratification, nearsightedness, and irresponsibility.
Life on the Sidewalk naturally pulls you to poverty. Because the Sidewalk is about the short term, it never works for the long term.
You can’t medicate poor money management with more money.
The common denominator is consistent: There is no plan and no savings—spend more than you earn and trade a secure tomorrow for today’s “living large” lifestyle.
more money is not a solution to poor financial management.
Only a mindset change regarding money is a solution to money problems.
culture will define wealth for you by default.
If you think like most, “wealth” is instinctively defined by lavish luxury lifestyles.
it characterizes someone who maintains a millionaire image yet has no net worth.
The problem with looking wealthy versus being wealthy is that the former is easy while the latter is not.
Conspicuous wealth is an announcement to an easily impressed world: “I'm rich!”
Wealth isn't embodied in a car but in the freedom to know that you can buy it.
Wealth is not authored by material possessions, money, or “stuff,” but by what I call the three fundamental “F's”: family (relationships), fitness (health), and freedom
wealth is freedom and choice.
the dogged pursuit of “faux wealth” does something terribly destructive: It destroys real wealth.
the more you try to look rich, the tighter the grip of poorness becomes.
The ironic aftermath of looking wealthy is that it destroys freedom, health, and relationships—or real wealth.
People who declare, “Money doesn't buy happiness” have already concluded they will never have money. This old equivocation becomes the torchbearer to their poorness.
the natural thief of happiness: servitude, the antithesis of freedom.
Debt and Lifestyle Servitude keeps people bound to work and unbound to relationships.
If we are too busy chasing the next greatest gadget to strike down the competitive opulence of the Joneses, we finance our misery.
If you're held hostage to your wardrobe, your car, your loft, your budgets, your Excel spreadsheets, and your predicted stock market forecasts, you aren't wealthy because you lack the freedom to act at will.
“Wealth” and “happiness” are interchangeable, but only if society hasn't corrupted your definition of wealth with its consumer version.
Because of my obligations to “stuff,” I imprisoned myself in a job I loathed. Yet, this cycle of servitude is standard.
If you buy a boat and resort to mental gymnastics over affordability, YOU CAN'T AFFORD IT.
The siren call of Lifestyle Servitude is the false prophet of feel-good—instant gratification and immediate pleasure.
Wealth, like health, isn't easy. Both are cut from the same fabric with identical processes. They require discipline, sacrifice, persistence, commitment, and yes, delayed gratification.
Instant gratification is the bait, and Lifestyle Servitude is the hook.
Lifestyle Servitude steals freedom, and what steals freedom, steals wealth.
I've found that luck is quite predictable. If you want more luck, take more chances. Be more active. Show up more often. — Brian Tracy
Process creates events that others see as luck.
when you are “out there,” you stand a chance of being in the right place at the right time.
When you consistently act and bombard the world with your efforts, interacting with the waves of others, stuff happens.
To create luck, engage in processes, so probabilities move from NOTHING to SOMETHING. Luck is introduced when you play. If
Sidewalkers loathe process, so their financial plan omits standard processes (such as saving or budgeting) and relies on events.
big hits attempt to bypass the wealth journey and start at the finish line.
Sidewalker's mindset is anchored in three beliefs that keep them trapped there and vulnerable to moneymaking scams: Belief 1: Luck is needed for wealth. Belief 2: Wealth is an event, something I can buy or find in an easy 1-2-3 system. Belief 3: Others can give wealth to me.
The Law of Victims says you can't be a victim if you don't relinquish power to someone capable of making you a victim.
Instead of looking within, they look outward and project responsibility to some other entity. Victims are Sidewalkers who refuse to take the driver's seat of their own lives and live under a dark cloud of “theys” reflective of a “me against them” attitude.
Future crutches justify pleasurable nows and, behind the scenes, Lifestyle Servitude swells.
