Measurements: How do I measure if I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m succeeding in what I want?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\nThis isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t a formula we need to follow in our lives for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153success\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u201d but it is certainly a framework which we can integrate into our personal life and thinking.<\/p>\n
I feel that many of us forget the importance of having a big vision in life and values. We all start off young by having a dream. Yet when we get older, we become jaded, and stop seeking to achieve great things.<\/p>\n
When it comes to our values, we often compromise on our values. We forget our personal code of ethics. Of course, many of us fall victim to the values of society \u00e2\u20ac\u201d rather than following our own gut, intuition, and conscience.<\/p>\n
Methods: you need to have a strategy or a plan to achieve what you want. Do you want to be more creative, to create more art, and to feel more alive? You can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t sit on your bum and expect things to happen. Think of how you can be active<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201d how can you take an actionable step in your life to achieve what you want? Does that mean going out and making more photos, by connecting with other artists, or by attending a photography class, workshop, or by studying a photography book?<\/p>\nObstacles: what is preventing you from achieving what you want? Is it your lack of time, finances, or your lack of confidence in yourself? Identify what you think is your obstacle, and figure out how you can overcome it.<\/p>\n
Measurement: I think the best way to measure your \u00e2\u20ac\u0153success\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in life is by your own internal-measure of yourself. How do you feel about yourself? Disregard what others say, or your \u00e2\u20ac\u0153success\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in terms of finances, social media followers, or some other external measure.<\/p>\n
2. It isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t about the money<\/h2>\n
Being \u00e2\u20ac\u0153wealthy\u00e2\u20ac\u009d isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t about having a lot of money. Rather, many of us seek money in order to create the lives that we want. We see money as a symbol of freedom.<\/p>\n
The mistake we make though is that we think that having a lot of money will equal freedom. Not necessarily. There are many billionaires out there who are very financially wealthy, but essentially slaves to their companies or corporations. I doubt many of these billionaires can even take a nap when they want to.<\/p>\n
How much money do you need to create the life, and lifestyle that you want?<\/p>\n
Figure out what your ideal lifestyle is, then work backwards. Figure out how much you need to earn to achieve this lifestyle.<\/p>\n
3. What is the worst investment?<\/h2>\n
The worst investment (according to Tony Robbins) is to trade your time for money.<\/p>\n
Why? Because you can always earn more money. You can never earn more time.<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t afford to waste my time making money.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Jean Louis Agassiz\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Unfortunately many of us work for corporations or have office jobs in which our time equates to how much money we earn.<\/p>\n
But there are some ways you can control\/change this.<\/p>\n
For example, you might get a raise or a promotion at your company to earn more money. But if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re currently earning $40,000 a year and working 40 hours a week, is it a good idea to try to earn $50,000 a year, but working 60 hours a week? To me that is the worst trade-off you can make.<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Can anybody remember when the times were not hard and money not scarce?\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Ralph Waldo Emerson\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
No matter what, we will always feel anxious and insecure. No matter how rich you are, you will always feel like you need 10% more money to feel secure. Even billionaires say this.<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153My favorite things in life don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t cost any money. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really clear that the most precious resource we all have is time.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Steve Jobs\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Some practical ways you can liberate yourself from the time-money link.<\/p>\n
By starting your own company, you can disconnect your time from your money. For example, if you sell products, you can reach a point where you literally don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to work anymore, but you can still earn money.<\/p>\n
You can also prioritize time over money in your life. Rather than seeking to work more hours at your job, seek how to work fewer hours at your job \u00e2\u20ac\u201d yet still make a similar income.<\/p>\n
It also means that valuing your free time above money. Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t take on that extra shift, if you can use that time to do creative work, or spend time with family.<\/p>\n
Prioritize your time over money.<\/p>\n
For me, I will always (whenever possible) trade my money for more time. I will spend money on getting an Uber to save me time to get to the airport or meeting friends, instead of saving a few bucks and taking public transportation. If I need to save time in terms of convenience, I will buy something at a local (more expensive) store, rather than wasting time going to a huge store (miles away) to just save a few bucks.<\/p>\n
Think about how you can trade your money for more time. And never give away your time for free, unless it is for someone you really care about.<\/p>\n
4. The secret of financial wealth<\/h2>\n\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the whole secret: earn more, spend less, and automate it. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153 – Tony Robbins\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The concept is very simple: to become financially wealthy is to earn more money, spend less money, and learn how to automate the process.<\/p>\n
To earn more money, figure out how you can create more value in the life of others. Then figure out how you can start to sell a product, sell information, or perhaps do some consulting work.<\/p>\n
To spend less money, stop buying \u00e2\u20ac\u0153new\u00e2\u20ac\u009d things. Avoid buying new cars, new homes, new clothes, or new gadgets. Seek to live in a cheaper neighborhood, lower your lifestyle standards, or perhaps live in a cheaper city or country.<\/p>\n
To automate the process, make sure your credit card bills automatically pay themselves in full at the end of the month. Also automate your savings, or your investments, or your 401K\/Roth IRA, etc. A lot of banks offer this service, or often your workplace can offer it too.<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The best way to save is when you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see the money in the first place.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Tony Robbins\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
When I worked at my old company, I found the best way to save my money was to automatically transfer some of my paycheck to the company stock option. This allowed me to save money, because it all wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t being automatically transferred to my bank account. By transferring 20% of my money to the company stock, I had less money transfer to my bank account. Therefore I learned to adjust my spending and expenses, because I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t see the money in the first place.<\/p>\n
Just think to yourself, how can you do the following?<\/p>\n
\n- Increase your income<\/li>\n
- Decrease your expenses<\/li>\n
- Automate it<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
5. What are our human needs?<\/h2>\n
According to Tony Robbins, these are some of our human needs:<\/p>\n
\n- Comfort and certainty<\/strong>: Feeling secure (emotionally, financially, physically).<\/li>\n
- Uncertainty and variety<\/strong>: Having some randomness, excitement, and fun in our lives. Not doing the same thing over and over again.<\/li>\n
- Significance<\/strong>: To feel like our work is meaningful, and helping improve the lives of others.<\/li>\n
- Love and connection<\/strong>: To feel loved by others, and to love others. To feel part of a community or something greater than yourself.<\/li>\n
- Growth<\/strong>: To keep learning, improving, and growing. To not become stale and plateau. To have something to look forward to.<\/li>\n
- Contribution<\/strong>: As Tony Robbins says, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The secret to living is giving.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d What can you give to others, in terms of your wisdom, life experiences, finances, art, products, or information?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
If we can fulfill our human needs, how can we ever feel anxious, sad, or poor? If we focus on all the 6 things above, we will definitely create value for others, continue growing, and as a result increase our personal wealth.<\/p>\n
6. Create surplus value for others<\/h2>\n\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The only way to become wealthy, and stay wealthy, is to find a way to do more for others than anyone else is doing in an area that people really value.” – Tony Robbins\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Wealth isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t about being good at marketing, or tricking people through advertising. Wealth is about doing more for others than anyone else out there in the world. To gain wealth, you want to create surplus value for the lives of others. And the remainder of that surplus value will come back to yourself.<\/p>\n
That means create more value than you take.<\/p>\n
You can create value as an employee, as a parent, as a child, as an entrepreneur, as a creative, as a photographer, writer, dancer, or whatever.<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Albert Einstein\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think of how you can become \u00e2\u20ac\u0153successful\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u201d think of how you can continue to add more<\/em> value to the lives of others.<\/p>\nOne of the philosophies that has deeply influenced me is the \u00e2\u20ac\u015310x principle\u00e2\u20ac\u009d which is popular in silicon valley. The concept is to try to create 10x more value for others than anyone else in your field. According to the entrepreneur Peter Thiel, this will allow you to gain a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153creative monopoly\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in a field \u00e2\u20ac\u201d and therefore you will be able to gain profits.<\/p>\n
\n “If you wish to become great, learn to become the servant of many.” – Bible\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
How can you learn how to serve others? If you become a servant of millions of people, and help uplift, motivate, encourage, and inspire others \u00e2\u20ac\u201d how can you ever become financially poor?<\/p>\n
7. Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t compete<\/h2>\n
Money isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t a competition or a race. The person with the most 0\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s in their bank account when they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re dead doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t win anything.<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The day you stop racing is the day you win the race.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Bob Marley\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Only focus on yourself, your own personal financial goals. Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t compare your bank account, possessions, or success to anybody else out there.<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The only person you should try to be better than is the person you were yesterday.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Anonymous\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Be the architect of your own life experiences. Create the lifestyle you want for yourself (however much or little much that requires).<\/p>\n
Compound your value for others, by aiming to increase your abilities by 1% everyday. Focus on long-term growth. First focus on growing for yourself, then figuring out how you can help improve the lives of others.<\/p>\n
Stay focused on yourself, and you will never feel envy or jealousy to others.<\/p>\n
8. Speed it up<\/h2>\n\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153If everything seems under control, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not going fast enough.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Mario Andretti\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Life is short. Why are we working so slowly? Because we are certain of the future. We think we will live to 80.<\/p>\n
False. We never know when we will die\u00e2\u20ac\u201d whether we will get hit by a drunk driver, whether we will get hit by a truck (while texting and walking), or whether we get some sort of illness or disease.<\/p>\n
Speed up your life in terms of becoming \u00e2\u20ac\u0153wealthy\u00e2\u20ac\u009d by taking a shortcut.<\/p>\n
If you want true wealth, it means to have less than you already have. True wealth is about appreciation for what you have, not about craving what you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have.<\/p>\n
Of course, if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re living in poverty and constantly stressed about paying the bills, you probably want to make more money. But if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re living comfortably \u00e2\u20ac\u201d what can a few extra 0\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s in your bank account change in your life?<\/p>\n
9. Happiness as creative effort<\/h2>\n\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Happiness is not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Franklin D. Roosevelt\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Having more money won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make us happier. Having more creative freedom will give us happiness.<\/p>\n
There is a certain point where we will have \u00e2\u20ac\u0153enough\u00e2\u20ac\u009d money. And once you have enough money to give yourself freedom, spend the rest of your psychic energy in achieving great things\u00e2\u20ac\u201d creatively and for the benefit of others.<\/p>\n
Happiness lies in action and creative effort, not in having a lot of money. Just have enough money to build the life for yourself that you want, to give yourself the lifestyle to be creative. But once you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve achieved that, give an all-out effort for your creative pursuits.<\/p>\n
10. Keep moving<\/h2>\n\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Life is like a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Albert Einstein\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
If we become stagnant and stop moving, we will die. Kind of like a shark \u00e2\u20ac\u201d when a shark stops swimming, it will sink to the bottom of the ocean and die.<\/p>\n
When it comes to creating value for others, you have to keep moving. You need to keep innovating, coming up with new ideas, and creating value in the marketplace.<\/p>\n
Being an employee is a grind at times. But we need to keep moving forward. We need to stay motivated to keep learning new skills, to expand our expertise, and to keep moving up. We don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to settle. We want to create the best out of what we are given in life.<\/p>\n
11. Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t lose<\/h2>\n
The secret to becoming wealthy is to not become broke.<\/p>\n
As humans, we also tend to be risk averse\u00e2\u20ac\u201d we hate losing money more than it comes to making money:<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t gamble, because winning a hundred dollars doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t give me great pleasure. But losing a hundred dollars pisses me off.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Alex Trebek\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
One of the biggest money mistakes we make is losing it and going bankrupt. We risk too much of our money in bad investments.<\/p>\n
Before aiming to become rich, we need to avoid going broke:<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Invincibility lies in the defense.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Sun Tzu\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Avoid losing money, and never risk 100% of your money into one investment. Insure yourself against possible losses.<\/p>\n
Focus on your defense, not your offense when it comes to money.<\/p>\n
12. Keep giving<\/h2>\n\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Everyone can be great, because everyone can serve.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Life is about what we decide to give others, not what we decide to take:<\/p>\n
\n \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d – Winston Churchill\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
There are a lot of psychological studies which have shown (in America) that if we earn more than $75,000 a year, we won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t gain any more happiness. Of course this money amount is different depending where you live.<\/p>\n
The basic concept is that once we have enough money for paying our expenses, living humbly, and by feeling some sort of financial comfort\u00e2\u20ac\u201d more money doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t equal more happiness.<\/p>\n
Spending money can buy us happiness, if we use it wisely. This is how Tony Robbins suggests we invest our money:<\/p>\n
\n- 1. Investing in experiences<\/strong>: Traveling, learning new skills, taking classes or courses, instead of acquiring more possessions.<\/li>\n
- 2. Buying time for yourself<\/strong>: Trade your money for having more time, so you can pursue your passions.<\/li>\n
- 3. Investing in others<\/strong>: Money brings us the most happiness when we spend or invest it on others. Buy your friends a cup of coffee, a beer, or dinner. Realize the more money you share with others, the more will come back to you.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Conclusion<\/h2>\n
The most important lesson I learned from Tony Robbins regarding money was this: true wealth is when we can give without worrying and without fear<\/strong>.<\/p>\nI don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need much money to be happy. Just some money to pay the rent, to pay my bills, food, and a cup of coffee here and there.<\/p>\n
What does \u00e2\u20ac\u0153wealth\u00e2\u20ac\u009d mean to you, and how can you keep giving?<\/p>\n
That is true wealth.<\/p>\n
Always,
\nEric<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A while back, I read \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Money: Master the Game\u00e2\u20ac\u009d by Tony Robbins. Surprisingly, it was a fantastic read. Not only did I learn practical things about investing, but I also learned the value of \u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32735,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-32736","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/32736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32736"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/32736\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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