The majority of people think that ‘wealthy’ is simply just another word for rich.
Whilst the two are often linked I’m going to talk today about why becoming wealthy is rarely about the money.
What?
Wealth Isn’t Really About Money
Wealth means so many different things to different people, and usually is seen in one of two ways.
The most common understanding is that wealth is an adjective meaning ‘an abundance’ of something. This could be money or property but equally could be time, alpacas or whatever else takes your fancy.
The other way of looking at wealth is the amount of time freed up by someone who has enough passive income to live and support their family, without needing to ‘go to work’ – what some would dub ‘financial freedom’
Either way, it isn’t about the money.
When most people dream of getting a huge cash sum, either earned, inherited or won on the lottery – it is not the actual money that they want, more what it can give them.
Once they have got over their initial materialistic goals like wanting to buy the latest car, gadget or being able to wear designer shoes, with a tiny bit of follow up questioning it soon becomes apparent that what most people actually want is freedom.
- Freedom from debt,
- Freedom from their job, which ultimately means
- Freedom to be able to pursue their passions.
It really isn’t about having the money
If you ask any successful entrepreneur, they’ll tell you to follow your passion and let the money come later. Imagine that you had unlimited money, and didn’t need to earn a living – what would you do every day? That is your passion, and being able to pursue it will give you more fulfilment than anything else.
Passion = Wealth
Wealthy people didn’t become so by being cleverer or having more money than you. Each wealthy individual has found their own way to where they are now and has learned a lot in the process, but the one thing that most of them have in common is that they worked toward something that they were passionate about.
If you’re passionate and can see the bigger picture, you’ll find the strength to carry on. Without passion, you’ll just give up. You might earn a living, but you won’t stick with it and learn how to build a resilient business that can run without your constant input.
Becoming wealthy is all about having an abundance of courage, of dedication, and of seeing something through to the end. You can become wealthy doing anything.
Caution: One of the problems that many business owners fall into is that instead of creating a business that generates them income and frees up their time, they create a new job for themselves. They focus exclusively on profits, and ignore the time-cost of doing it all themselves, which is fine if what you’re looking for is a higher salary and being your own boss. But, to find freedom, you need to build your business strategy around creating time rather than money – otherwise you don’t really have wealth at all.
Know what wealth means to you
So looking at it this way you could say that people that survive on benefits or a pension are financially free. They have more wealth than the majority of the population. However, their wealth isn’t financial. What they have is an abundance of time.
Losing my mum, 7 years ago (she was only 59) made me realise that I for one, do not want to wait until I retire to have the time to do all the things in life that I want to. I want to create a wealthy life NOW, balancing income with time and moving me towards financial freedom.
This has resulted in massive changes in both my business and my personal life, and I’m pleased that you’ve chosen to be a part of my journey.
Wealth isn’t the same for everyone
Being wealthy is as subjective as being good looking. Some people want more time, some people want more stuff, some people just want to see how big they can build their business.
If you’re at this stage in your life and want to be able to move forward, it’s imperative that you figure out exactly what wealth means to you. Sit down with a pen and paper and spend 10 minutes answering these three questions to find out what your passion is, and what wealth means to you:
- How much money do you actually need to be financially free?
- What would you do if you had enough money to look after yourself and your family?
- If you could solve one problem in the world what would it be?
Once you have defined what “being wealthy” means to you, we can chat more about how to achieve that goal and figure out what your next step to financial freedom is.