When I was growing up, I was embarrassed of the living situation my family was in. Being the second eldest of six children, I saw first hand how much my family lacked -financially. I was always taught to be proud, and to never let anyone know how much we didn’t have.
The lies I told
(Da lone lies)
I remember going to school after one Christmas vacation. My teacher asked us to write about the Christmas presents that we had received.
My story, although beautifully written, was all lies. I had listened to the other students talk about the wonderful presents they received earlier in the day, and while it was easy to just be quiet and listen, there was no escape for me at this point. I didn’t want them to know that there were no presents, much less a Christmas Tree at my house.
So I talked about the fantastic presents my cousins received, making them my presents in my story. I painted a picture of unboxing the present that was equivalent to the joy I felt when I got to touch my cousins' presents for a second on Christmas Day.
Another time, I remember being asked by my best friend’s mom what I had for lunch one day. I was utterly embarrassed to tell her that my mom had whipped up this flour thing her grandma taught her to make with the last remains of flour available in the house.
There wasn’t even enough for her to eat, so instead, I made up a story of the mouth watering hamburgers my mother had learned to prepare from her grandma. So while not 100% lies, lies nonetheless.
Our Greatest Desires
(Di thing we want most)
One of our greatest desires in life is to have an abundant amount of wealth and never have to worry about money again. While this has been easy for a select number of people to achieve, it seems like it’s an impossible task for us.
We often become discouraged comparing our earnings to those of other people who seem to come by it effortlessly.
What makes them different? Why is it that acquiring and maintaining wealth seems to be easier for them than it is for us?
Surely there may be a secret formula that they aren’t sharing with the rest of us. But is it really that, or have we not been curious enough to seek out the formula for ourselves?
The purpose of this post, along with the next two that follow, is to share the secrets to wealth building with you. I have opted to break it down into three parts, to give you time to digest each part, and implement it before moving on to the others.
Before you become discouraged, and think that wealth building is not possible for you, I want you to think of the story I shared with you in the beginning. A story I have only partially shared with one person on this earth, but am now sharing with you so that you understand that you can have nothing, and still amass great wealth.
*Disclaimer*
While I’m still on my wealth building journey myself, I have seen how these three laws have withstood the test of time, and although learning about them from a book written hundreds of years ago, they have helped me to amass more wealth than I ever thought possible.
So remember whether you work for yourself, or for someone else, know that you have the ability to generate immense wealth by learning and mastering these three laws.
Schools Don’t Teach You This
(Yuh noh Laan this da school)
When you go to school, you learn all the lessons that governments have decided are important for you to be a functional member of society. While these things are important, they only give you enough knowledge to get a job and earn enough money to survive.
You can read more about how the education system was designed to keep us poor in this blog post here.
So in an effort to learn about wealth building, I started seeking out this information on my own. The answer to it came down to three simple laws that have never been taught to me by any of the educational institutions I have attended.
Like I said before, these answers were found in an amazing book that was written hundreds of years ago, yet still whole true today. If you read through all three parts of this series of posts, I will be sharing a link to the free audiobook version of that book at the end.
Law 1 of Becoming Rich.
“A part of all you earn is yours to keep”- George Clason
It sounds very simple right, actually, all we earn is supposed to be ours, (after taxes that is.) Yet, so many of us keep nothing of what we earn.
With our spending habits, most of us already have 100% of our salaries committed to something before we earn it. We are simply waiting for payday, so that we can indulge, or pay for those “necessities” that we have.
Payday to payday
(dah di same ina kreole)
Once we jump onto that payday to payday caravan, there seems to be no escape from it. It seems like the only way out of it, is increasing what we earn, yet as the years come to an end, and we receive those appraisals, we still can’t seem to get off the boat.
We pay the hairdresser, the grocery store owner, our landlords, doctors, teachers, restaurants and bars but we still can’t figure out how to keep something for ourselves.
The first rule of wealth building is keeping a minimum of 1/10th of what you earn for you. Yet, it’s not as easily done as it is said. As we all seem to have an ever growing list of necessities.
The most important step to help you master the 1st rule
Understand the differences between wants and needs!
The challenge
Many of the things on our endless list of necessities actually don’t qualify as needs. So, to evaluate this list, white it all down on a piece of paper. Then being completely honest with yourself, cross off the things that you could live without.
Do this with no regret, understanding that there is a goal in mind. Understand that in order to reach the next steps in wealth building, we must first master discipline, self control and keeping 1/10 of what we earn.
Every payday after reading this blog post, pay yourself first. 1/10th of all that you earn is yours. Resist the urge to go after that list of temporary desires. Be disciplined enough to stick with it.
You may find it easier to stick with it by building a budget since it allows you to visibly track all that you spend. You can access our free budget template by referring to our previous post about it here.
Light at the end of the tunnel?
(Ah reach yet?)
What will happen is that you will slowly start to live within your means. That bank account that gets drained at the end of every pay period, will begin to grow. Your confidence will also begin to grow.
You will start to amass a small fortune, one that you never thought was possible. And you will see it get bigger every pay day. It’s a beautiful thing to witness, and your discipline muscles will also begin to grow.
Yikes, Here Comes Our Old Self
(Really kan’t teach wah old dog new tricks?)
But you will also begin to get tempted. Now that you have more money than you did before, you will start to think about all the things you can afford now, that you couldn’t afford before. Your brain will start to rationalize how much you deserve these things.
After all, you have been disciplined and managed to amass a tiny fortune like never before.
Resist it
(Not give in)
Yes, you heard me right, don’t use it as a down payment for a car. Don’t use it to buy the newest IPhone. Don’t use it for that vacation you have always wanted to take. Remember that by doing this, you fall back into the same habits and lifestyle of being broke-ALL THE TIME!
Next week, we will be talking about what should be done with this small fortune that is now in your possession. So be sure to keep an eye out for that post since the next rule is so simple, I just can’t understand how we aren’t taught this in schools.
About GiggedBz
Being an entrepreneur or managing a household can be very stressful. Somedays you really just need some help. And I'm sure we can agree that good help is hard to find. This is why we made, Gigged.bz.
