The School of Greatness - 3 TAX HACKS to CRUSH Your Money Goals in the NEW YEAR

Episode Date: December 1, 2023

Tune in and revolutionize your financial mindset!Jaspreet Singh, otherwise known as the Minority Mindset, is a qualified attorney, investor, and CEO of both Market Briefs and Market Insider. Although he didn’t receive any formal financial education, he is on a mission to make financial education fun and accessible. His brand has helped countless people get out of debt, start investing, and create a plan for building wealth.Jen Sincero is a #1 New York Times best-selling author, a success coach, a motivational speaker, and a badass! Through her various seminars and speaking engagements, Jen has helped transform the personal and professional lives of countless people. Feeling frustrated at her 40-year-old self with an empty bank account, Jen rose to become a successful entrepreneur traveling the world. Her book You Are a Badass: How to Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living an Awesome Life, has spent over four years on the New York Times bestseller list. It is available in over 35 languages and has sold over 3 million copies, and is still growing in popularity globally. Dave Ramsey is an eight-time national bestselling author, personal finance expert and host of The Ramsey Show, heard by 23 million listeners every week. He has appeared on Good Morning America, CBS This Morning, Today, Fox News, CNN, Fox Business and many more. Since 1992, Dave has helped people take control of their money, build wealth and enhance their lives. He also serves as CEO for the company Ramsey Solutions.In this episode you will learnThe difference between tax avoidance and tax evasion.How to rethink your yearly income.Why it’s important to question where you put your savings.How to go from being broke to having a financial freedom plan.How to create healthy money habits that stick in the new year.For more information go to www.lewishowes.com/1538For more Greatness text PODCAST to [phone]Find the full episodes here:Jaspreet Singh – https://link.chtbl.com/1411-podJen Sincero – https://link.chtbl.com/1101-podDave Ramsey – https://link.chtbl.com/1415-pod

Your savings are not there to make you wealthy, they're there to protect you against an emergency. You take your income, you subtract your expenses, and that equals your investments plus your savings. So, if you want to become wealthy, it ultimately comes down to... Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro-athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today.

Now let the class begin. Welcome to this special masterclass. We brought some of the top experts in the world to help you unlock the power of your life through this specific theme today. It's going to be powerful. So let's go ahead and dive in. We talked about how to save your money. We talked about how to invest your money.

We talked about how to manage your expenses. But now let's talk about the income. Because if now you understand how to live below your means, you understand how to put your expenses but let's talk about the income because if now you understand how to live below your means you understand how to put your money to work if you want to put fuel on the fire you just got to earn more money now if you earn a hundred thousand dollars you earn a million dollars you earn whatever you earn more money now you know how to put this money through your system through your funnel whether 75 15 10 or, 10, or whatever else, you know how to take this extra money, put it to work. That way you have more money to invest, more money to

save, more money to live your life. But the key is you don't want to 100% increase your lifestyle to match your income. You want to increase your income with your investments. And keep your expenses the same. Ideally. Now you can marginally increase your expenses, but the key is you want to be increasing your income and your investments way more. Yes. So the question is, how do you do that? Well, this is where, again, understand you. If you are an employee, you don't want to start a business. You don't want to start a side hustle. Fine. Nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with being an employee. You just have to understand you. But that means now, how can you earn more money?

If you like your job, look for ways to get a raise, to get a promotion. See how you can get a bonus. Just be open with your boss. Say, hey, look, I want to be able to contribute more. I want to earn more money. What can I do? Most people are going to be very open and honest. Say, hey, I would like you to tack on this, this, and this.

Do this, and then we will help raise your salary. Maybe if you don't like your job, you go and get a certificate. You go and do something else. You need to figure out now how you can earn your increased income. What value can you bring to the business to bring in more money for the business or save more time or create some system so that the business can say, okay, cool, let's give you more opportunities for growth. Exactly. I mean, if you can bring in an extra $10,000 a year to the business of profit, they're not going to have a problem paying me you $5,000 or whatever it might be. Right.

And this is where you just want to be open because every business is different. Maybe take on a second job and, you know, it's just figuring out how can you earn more money there? Now, if you say, well, I want to do something outside of my job. Fine. Well, the first thing you can can do start a side hustle so much more accessible now than ever before I mean you can go on to the internet become a virtual assistant you can become a copywriter you can become a designer you can become a video editor I have paid so up work they're not paying me up work is

a platform that I use to hire freelancers. And I did a video on this, so I looked this up. In the last two years or three years, I have spent more than a quarter million dollars on Upwork alone. Wow. On different individuals. Different individuals. Just hiring people in different areas

who don't work for me. They work on their own schedule because now this freelancing business has grown so much. And so there's a lot of opportunity there where now if can if you can present a service you can make money doing that yeah they might be working an extra five ten twenty hours a week on the side or they might just be full-time freelancers yeah yeah and you get to set your hours for the most part you can really do something that you like that you enjoy that you're good at so there's a lot of opportunity there where now you can be a freelancer

or start your own side hustle. If you have an idea, you want to, one of my buddies, his mom is really good at making cakes. And she started this, what is it called? Carrot cake business. They're making a good,

I don't know how much, maybe I think it's like $700 or $1,000 a month selling carrot cakes from Instagram. He markets on Instagram. People say, hey, can you make me a cake? His mom makes month selling carrot cakes from Instagram. You market some on Instagram. People say, hey, can you make me a cake? His mom makes the cake and he delivers it. Sure, sure. It's just the number of opportunities.

Now, of course, as an attorney, I should say there are liabilities to selling food, get insurance and all that. But this is where there are so many opportunities, right? Just being a hustler, just getting yourself out there, figuring it out. And there's an unlimited amount of possibilities and opportunities out there. Now, if you want to take it one step further, you could try to build your own business. Your side hustle can turn into your own business. If you have a business idea, invest in it.

First, invest in your mind, invest in your education, and then try to do it. You want to invest as little money as possible until you start generating revenue. Again, mindset versus tool set we assume that we need all these tools to start doing it but the reality is the first thing you need is your mind because there's a lot of alternatives on how you can do it like when i started i started a sock company a number of years ago when i was trying to figure things out and it was a water resistant sock yeah and the interesting thing was I knew nothing about socks. How do you manufacture socks?

How do you make them waterproof? And so I was working with textile engineers. I was working with manufacturing companies. I was working with a lot of different people. I didn't have a lot of money. And now we're talking about a real product. So I learned to talk. And essentially, I did not, I think my total cost to build my first round of socks was $3,500.

It's not a lot of money, but relative to what, if you want to manufacture products and create a product to go through the prototype after prototype to prototype. Right. It costs typically $100,000 plus. I did it for under four grand because i was able to talk to them i used to talk about the potential i and i worked with them to build out these special deals where hey work with me here and you know i'll do more business in the future exactly and we were able to get it going so it's the ability to hustle be willing to find a way and that's that mindset that sometimes too much money can be a disease especially if you

want to be a side hustler or a business because now you just start spending money and i've been a victim of that too i i'll just give examples like the minority mindset blog i didn't know how to build a blog and my time was so eaten up with things like market briefs talking about building this tax business, although that's much newer, but building my companies, building my YouTube channel, doing all these other things, investing in real estate that I didn't really care about building a blog. I cared about it, but I didn't have the brain capacity and the time to sit here and come up with a strategy to do it. So I outsourced it. I hired some of literally the top blog managers in the world and they charged me a lot of money

like as in six figures plus right a hundred thousand dollars plus to manage the blog and they promised all this stuff I was like fine do it so a hundred thousand dollars for the blog manager at least another hundred thousand dollars on blog content over the course of 12 months and guess what no results zero nothing the worst what did i do too much money problem i just i said i don't got the time just gonna throw money at it hopefully that will fix the problem because if you can get the top blog manager you can hire people to write it's easy right well after those 12 months the contract was over fired them and this is where I was like all right you know what let me figure this out because

I do want to build a blog and so we build a brand new strategy it costs us a fraction like teeny tiny fraction what we were paying before it would bigger results our blog is growing we're generating revenue now I mean it's it's a complete turnaround but it's that mindset versus tool set. And these are real stories, real things that I have gone through. So you need to know now, how do you multiply your income and understand that you don't need thousands of dollars. My first business, I started with nothing, essentially, when I started my bed planning company. I started minority mindset with under a few hundred dollars. I mean. I was making videos off of my cell phone.

You just need some hustle, some creativity, some action, some consistency, some relationships, some communication, and just making stuff happen. The hustle, man. And that's why I always say keep hustling at the end of my videos because the hustle mentality is so crucial. And you can't teach that. You can't read that in books. You have to actually live it. And so this is where now if you want to read that in books you have to actually live it yes and

so this is right now if you want to really do that you have to understand the hustle mentality work and this brings me now to the be great aspect the last part now like you speaking my language exactly right exactly greatness so you've built the base you're putting some money to work you're leading your money you are either paying off your home or you're understanding how to use your extra cash the right way, you're increasing income, that way you can build your wealth even faster. Now it's all about being great. And there's two aspects to this. The first aspect that I want to talk about is protecting yourself because the reality is when people realize that you have money, they're going to try to take their hand, put it in your pocket, and keep some for themselves. You know, to pause on you there, I remember hearing Oprah talk about this one time.

Years ago, I heard her on some podcast or somewhere. She said something like, as she started to rise to fame with her talk show and started to make a lot more money, what do you think happened? Everyone's reaching out with a handout, right? Oh, you got money now, can you help me with $1,000 here? Can you help me with this? Well, you've made the money, can you help me? She said, I'm paraphrasing this,

but after like, I don't know, a decade of this or something, it just felt like everyone was using her, as opposed to just being in relationship with her and having an actual friendship or relationship. And she said that she decided after a period of time, she was tired of just giving, giving, giving, giving to people who had a handout. And so she said, I'm going to do a big dinner and I'm going to invite everyone, friends,

family, everyone, you know, third cousins, you know, twice removed, everyone who's been asked for a handout, I'm going to invite them all. you know, twice removed. Everyone who's been asked for a handout, I'm gonna invite them all. And she said, it's like, she gave out, she had this massive dinner for everyone, like all of the, everything you could eat. And she started giving out envelopes and gifts

and cars and cash. And just like, she gave out gifts based on what she wanted to give to each person. Yeah. Everyone got something. And she said, she gave a speech at the end and said, "'This is all I'm gonna give you. "'Don't ask for anything else after this.'" And she said, still, people were complaining,

"'Oh, you gave this person 10 grand, I only got 5,000.'" It's like, you gotta learn to protect yourself, mentally, psychologically, financially, because you could just be giving and giving and giving it can never end great right a hundred percent and how do you do this that's that's a huge relationship aspect I'm gonna take a one step a little bit deeper on the legal side because you're you're absolutely right you know I struggle with that relationship side as well because I'm not saying don't be generous, but also it's like when you feel like you're being taken advantage of,

then it becomes challenging. So my family is from a state in India called Punjab. And what happens, a lot of people, is you come here to America or somewhere like Canada. My family came to America. And your family is in India. And they think, oh, my God, you're wealthy in America, so you're working your butt off here

while sending money back to India. So, you know, my parents did this, my dad did this a lot where especially when we were young, he wasn't making a lot of money but he was always sending money back to his siblings or people

just to help take care of them because that's our culture to help take care of people. And it becomes difficult because, you know, it's that, at least for me, that cultural aspect of giving which I like taking

care of family but then also not making them reliant on you because now once you start giving then this thing yeah and so it's a very tough balance and I don't have a good answer for you here because you know I do like taking care of people I like helping people especially you know within my family I will you know I want to make sure i can take care of everyone that's why i work hard because i want to make sure that i can give you and so when i because i i have given money to people around me my family and my friends the way that i look at it is i don't want that money back i know when i give you money i'm never going to ask her back and i don't want it back if you give it back to me maybe i'll take it but i'm never gonna ask her back and I will give based

off of what I can but I know that's money in my mind I'm never getting back and I have to be okay with that for myself and if I'm okay with that that's fine and I think that's one of those things where I don't because I don't want to mess up the relationship right with my family that's more important to me and so look if i'm okay giving you a thousand dollars here's a thousand never talk to me about it again right and really that's it and if i see you blow the money in dumb ways guess what when you ask me for another grand you're not getting it yeah you know it's as simple as that i'm gonna forget about it i don't like

arguing over money i think that's very dirty and evil so i'll you know i am generous in that sense but you know i'm also very straightforward where if i feel like hey i'm not'm not going to give it to you, I'm not going to do it. Yeah. But I also don't sit here and ask for it back. But you're talking about protecting yourself legally. Legally, which means now having the right advisors, accountants, and insurance to protect you. And so when you start earning money, people are going to try to reach into your pockets and get it. Also, legally.

I had a tenant in one of my properties, sue my real estate company, because they said that the bathtub got too slippery when the water was on. Jeez. And because it was so slippery when the water was on, it caused them to slip and fall, which then… It's a bathtub. It's a bathtub with water.

And because of that that they wanted damages for injuries. But you just have to defend yourself even if it's not your problem. And so this is where how do you protect yourself?

So I had a couple things. One, I had an LLC. Second, I had insurance. And third, I had a property manager company. Property management company. And so

I'll go through the different layers so you can see all the different levels of insurance and how they worked because now the first thing that happens is my property management company. And so I'll go through the different layers. You can see all the different levels of insurance and how they worked because now the first thing that happens is my property management company documented everything because prior to them slipping, they made a complaint that there was about a quarter inch by quarter inch chip in the bathtub. And they said, oh, there's a little paint chip. We want to get this fixed. So my contractor goes out there. He says, okay, yeah, we can fix this. And my contractor said, you know, the tenants here are kind of old. Let's install them a handicap pool just to be nice. We weren't required to do this. We were fully licensed by the city, but my contractor

offered to do this. So now they go back to do the work. The tenants say, we don't want you to do it. We're tired. He goes back to do it again. They said, we don't want you to do it. The tenant slipped and fell at a barbecue. They go back. He back he said no he's still injured from the barbecue so we have notes of all this sure and then they go and say that they slipped and fell in the bathtub we have records of all this where they said they slipped and fell at a barbecue and now they're saying they flipped and fell in the bathtub why are they doing that well maybe they can try to get some money out of the quote-unquote rich landlord i was a very young kid at this time i was still in college um trying to dig into those pockets thinking that oh if he's a real estate

investor he must have a lot of money and so they use one of those free attorneys to go after my insurance so now i have insurance so now my insurance company gives me an attorney to protect me through this process. And the judge laughed at the case. Even the attorney laughed at the case. He was like, look, man, they're just trying to grab money. There's nothing here. It's a frivolous lawsuit.

So we just have to do it. And the insurance company wants to settle because it's cheaper to settle than to pay $350 to $400 an hour to the attorney to fight it and actually win the case. And so that's where the insurance came in and protected me. They fought me for me and defended me and then paid out the settlement. Now, if it had escalated further, that's where the LLC protects me, which is where you want to have a good attorney there to recommend what's best for you because that LLC then kind of creates a shield where you can only take what the LLC owns and you can't go after my personal assets. So if the LLC only owns that property, you can't go

after anything that I own because the LLC is what owns the real estate. So you want to make sure you protect yourself there. So this is where having those right shields to protect you are so important because especially in America we are the most litigious country in the world and he want to make sure you protect yourself against that and there's a funny saying in real estate that if you haven't been sued as a real estate investor you haven't been in business long enough Wow so it's just one of those things where you want to protect yourself. I think people also got to also understand this is a full contact sport, you know, learning how to follow these six steps that you've laid out, which I think are great, but learning how to be, you know, an investor, it doesn't come easy for everyone right away.

You're going to make some mistakes. There's going to be some challenges to face. And the longer you're in it, you just have to deal with stuff that's not fun, right? This is something you have to deal with. There's probably months of a back and forth thing. And there's some stress. There's some worry. There's conversation.

It's time. It's energy with insurance, with lawyers, just to deal with something that even isn't your fault. 100%. with lawyers, just to deal with something that even isn't your fault. A hundred percent. And, you know, this is one of the realities of being an investor, an entrepreneur, where, you know, understanding the aspects and there are going to be some things that are not fun. Like I talked about in our previous podcast,

the tax issue. I know. It was where my accountant calls me up saying that, hey, just believe this is nine in the morning. You owe $100,000 by the end of the day. Sucks. Send it into the IRS. That sucks. And now I have to go figure out how to do this, send it in. And then he tells me that I also have to pay a penalty on this because he did something wrong. So it's one of those things that's not fun. It's a problem. But then as an entrepreneur,

how do you find the opportunity? Well, first I fired the accountant. I go on the hunt for a new accountant, a new tax advisor. I start working with this new tax advisor and I see the difference between a bad accountant and a good accountant. I started learning, wow, you're telling me that every month we can meet and you can advise me on what I can do with my money. That way I can legally limit my tax liability and you're going to do all this work in advance and I don't have to worry about this ever. I love that. Now with my entrepreneurial brain, I'm like, let's start working together because there's so many small businesses that need this. It is a real problem because there's a lot of bad accountants out there and we need more good accountants. We need more

good tax advisors who are going to help people, especially in this new age where we have more IRS agents joining the workforce. We have a lot of things changing. We're probably going to see a change in tax laws. So you want to make sure that you're taking care of yourself. So this is one of the things that I'm working on with him is to fix that. We don't have a website or anything. So if you want to learn more, shoot me a DM on Instagram at Minority Mindset or email me at team at the minoritymindset.com. But this is just one of those things where you want to make sure you have the right resources there to first be great to protect yourself for your family. And I'm going to take that one step further.

Because as an attorney, you also want to make sure you have the right estate planning in place. Because this is one of those things that is really not fun, but so crucial. If you build any sort of wealth, you want to tell the world and when I die where's it go where's it gonna go because if you don't your family's gonna fight over it man and it's not fun because no one wants to think about what happens after I die but it is so so so important because when you die you don't want your family fighting at your funeral and so create a will create a trust have an estate planning attorney that can help guide you there because you never want to have

to worry about that and the second aspect of being great is being great for the world where the more you have the more you can do you can give back you can do more things whether it's your money whether it's your time whether it's your education because when you can light a candle well you can light one candle but that one candle can also light a million other candles and this is where now as you're on this journey to build wealth you have lit your own candle now you can help light someone else you can help give someone a helping hand whether you help someone financially whether you help them with your time whether you help them through expertise because now you've learned the process because information is meant to be shared.

I talk about this stuff on YouTube, not because I wanted to get rich, but because I was so frustrated by the system, right? I never knew that I could even make money on YouTube. I started making videos without even turning advertisements on. I didn't know that you could do that until someone showed me,

hey, you can make money from these videos. And so it's the whole idea of helping to spread because you know like we've talked about in this video this this podcast there's so much misinformation out there there's so much lack of information out there and financially like if you don't understand money if you don't have money it can ruin so many other aspects of your life because if you don't have money you're stressing about money now you can't take your spouse on the vacation that they want you can't pay for your kids education you can't fund your retirement you can't buy that gift that you want you can't do anything and now you're stressing

it makes your mental health worse it can put you into depression it can make you start eating bad it can make your physical health worse it can make you feel so unfulfilled it can make you feel so spiritually beat so this is where understanding hey more money isn't going to fix every aspect of your life but if you don't have money it can impact every aspect of your life But if you don't have money, it can impact every aspect of your life. What do you think are the key things that abundant mindset people around money do differently than scarcity mindset people around money? If you had to say three or five kind of key things. They appreciate it, as you said. That is a a biggie they appreciate it and they speak about it as they love it they're not weird about it they're also generous with it because

when you pinch yourself off from giving you that is sort of a subconscious way of saying there's not enough to go around and it's not going to come i'm not in the flow so when you don't give generously it's because you're scared that it's not going to come in anymore. They take risks. You know, you got to take risks. You are where you are because you've been doing what you've been doing. So if you want to change your life, you've got to do stuff you've never done. What else? Wealthy people. They learn about money. Like you focus on money. Like that was such a big thing for me too. Like when I was broke, I never wanted to learn about money. You focus on money. That was such a big thing for me too. When I was broke, I never wanted to think about money. I was all about writing songs and doing much more noble things. Sure, sure.

But when you're broke, all you think about is money. I don't really think about money that much now that I have it, but every single decision you make when you're broke is about- Well, I have enough to pay for this. Can I afford it? What happens if I don't have- Right. You wake up first thing in the morning in- Do I have enough to pay for this? Exactly. Can I afford it? What happens if I don't have- Right. You wake up first thing in the morning in a panic because you got to pay your bills. So you're always thinking about money. So it is really just sort of getting in the flow with that and just being on good terms with it and focusing on it.

And how are you going to make it? Like being realistic about your income streams and if you want to make it, you've got to coax it in, you know, give it. Yeah. I'm curious about this. Okay. You, you're a starving artist. You wanted to do noble things, which about art and making art and all these different things. What would have happened if someone would have said, Jen, you know what? I love that you're an artist. I love that you have this, you know what? I love that you're an artist. I love that you have this, you know, passion for art and you want to keep doing this. And this is where you've been for 40 years and we don't want you to change. Here's a hundred grand a year for the rest

of your life. Don't worry about money up to a hundred grand. What would that have done to you if someone would have given you a hundred grand a year and you would have just been like, okay, I'm going to write and do whatever I want. And how do you think it would have been mentally, emotionally, spiritually versus you having to risk emotionally, mentally, you getting to heal, let go, overcome, challenge yourself into asking for money and to becoming something greater than that limiting belief. What do you belief, what do you think, what do you think it'd be now? Probably would have spent it on beer, honestly, back in those days. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I wasn't, you, you're absolutely right. It's an, it's an,

it's a frequency, you know, it's like, it's like, uh, I don't know. I mean, I always, I always had, I guess I'm going to say gall. That's not the right word, but I did, I didn't do a lot of stuff that was pretty edgy and I pushed the envelope a lot. So I may have gotten there, but I don't think it would have been as exciting as it was to do it myself. You know, there really is. You do grow. And they say, you know, starting your own business is the best personal development course you can possibly take because all your stuff comes up, right?

All of it. Relationship training, it's leadership training, it's inner child training, everything. Everything, totally. Every button is pushed. Totally.

So it wouldn't have been as satisfying, I don't think. I think I still would have done it though because that is kind of my personality. When I'm ready to change, I'm ready to change and I do it. Yeah, yeah. So, but I think it wouldn't have been as satisfying. I don't think. I think I still would have done it though, because that is kind of my personality. When I'm ready to change, I'm ready to change and I do it. But I think it wouldn't have been as glorious and I probably wouldn't have written You Are a Bat, which totally changed my entire life. It changed yours, but it also changed other people's lives. Yes. So it's who you become, the lessons you learn, the wisdom you have to then be able to

be of service and teach from your own experience. Yeah. The book about me getting a hundred grand a year just for being would not be that interesting to people. Right. Yeah. Right. That's interesting. Yeah.

What has been the biggest lesson in the last 10 years? Cause that was 10 years ago when you wrote, you are back. Right. And you've written two or three books since then. I believe what has been the biggest lesson, three books since then. Yeah. What has been the biggest lesson in 10 years since you are a bad to now,

personally, physically, and financially? Oh man. Let me think. Okay. The biggest lessons since I wrote you are a bad. Because when you get more money, more impact, more celebrity fame in an industry, people change around you. Some people don't, some people do. Right. You get to make different choices with your health.

Right. In positive or negative. Right. You have more abundance to do bad things or good things. Yeah. And you get to see how you show up emotionally, spiritually as well. Yeah, that's such an interesting question.

You know, I definitely feel like since it came out and has had the success, you know, that I've gotten better and better. It really, this sounds cold, but like not caring what other people think about me. Like that is something that I'm really dedicated to right now where it's like the one star reviews and the five star reviews. You know, it's like, believe me, I'm so grateful anybody reads the book, but five star reviews are the real dangerous ones, right? Where you're just like, I'm so cool. People think I'm funny and smart, you know, really getting good inside, like just being like, it doesn't matter as long as I think it's good. And I think it's funny and I think it's funny and i think it's helpful that's it and so that has been really important to me because it is weird i mean i'm sure you too like people know who you are and it's like

it's it's a little uncomfortable sometimes i mean it's great too like i love meeting my readers but it's just like i can't get too wrapped up in their opinion of me because it's about my opinion of me. So that's been a really big one. So not letting the opinions of others be the opinions of you about you. Right. Yeah. Interesting. This really coming through.

The high hype and the low low. Yeah, definitely. Because you hear a lot about the low lows, like don't focus on the criticism, but you really got to watch it with the five star stuff too. That's interesting. Because then if it goes away,'re screwed right you're totally screwed i mean that's why so many celebrities wind up in rehab you know especially if you i always think about this too that i'm so glad for me anyway that it started when i was older if i imagine

oh man i was getting all these accolades i would be be such an idiot. I know. Like, no way. I'm really great. I'm so grateful for all of it. My God. That's personally. What about this lesson? Financially? Financially. I guess I love giving money away. Like I didn't I really honestly never thought I was that generous of a person. But I am. But so I'm very happy to find that out about myself. Cause I didn't really think that I was, but also that I, um, I was just making fun of this this morning with a friend of mine that I'm still kind of cheap with myself in ways. Like I'm not great at like, I mean, I have a nice house. I have a nice car. I certainly spend plenty of money on myself, but I can just be like, I'm not good at being rich and like getting room service and like spending. I'm just, I'm still kind of, you know, the Italian immigrant's daughter who sort of pays

attention. So not that that's bad, but. It's interesting. I have a little bit of that in me. Although in the last couple of years, I've started to learn how to take care of me with travel and food and convenience and saving time. Convenience. Whereas for, I don't know,

the first five years of my business, I was making money, right? It's not like I didn't have money, but I was so afraid to lose it also that I was just stacking it. Every time I travel, I would try to find, who do I know in this town

that I can sleep on their couch? Yeah. Isn't it funny? Because I was like, I'm not going to pay 200 bucks a in this town that I can sleep on their couch. Yeah. Isn't it funny? Because I was like, I'm not going to pay 200 bucks a night for a room. What are you talking about? I can use that money and I can put it somewhere else. And I was always like, how do I just get on the cheapest bus fare? How do I get the middle backseat on Southwest? How do I get the $39 flight and just sit there for six hours in the middle and just crammed. Yeah.

As opposed to convenience and saving time and having my health optimized and using it to do those things. But I was afraid to lose it. So I was just work, work, work to make it, but I was afraid to lose it for a while. Yeah. And also the value. I still, and I make myself too, but I hate paying for parking. I would rather drive.

And we're talking like $2 in a meter. I'm so weird about that. I'm like- You'd rather roll on the block five times and try to find a place to park. Just waste gas, waste my time. Like it's so stupid. But I, and I crack up like, but I also have this thing where like, I'll spend 60 grand to put solar on my house, but I won't spend $15 on a wooden spoon. Like I'm just kind of funny catching yourself where you're. Well, I think there's a, there's a, there's a power in being mindful with your money and being, I would call it frugal, I guess, maybe in certain ways, but abundant in other ways. Right. It's like be abundant in certain ways, but don't just overspend on everything

because you have the money. Yeah, I guess. I know. So mindful of certain things, finding, you know, whatever level you're at too, you know, like when you don't have money, you also don't just overspend on everything because you have the money. Yeah, I guess. I know. So mindful of certain things. Minding, you know, whatever level you're at too, you know, like when you don't have money, you also don't want to be pinched off and stingy with it. Like it really is about, this isn't just, you know, two people with money talking about it. It really is about figuring out where you're at and how to stay in that abundance mindset and in the flow

and leaving an extra dollar when you tip or whatever you know but just really catching yourself when you're pinching it off because doesn't matter how much we're talking about but it's that pinching off if money is currency and currency is energy and you're pinching it off that is not going to do well for you yeah yeah what was the big lesson about relationships in the last 10 years whether it be yeah friend colleague intimate relationship yeah you know that people are still really uncomfortable with money and i i do feel like it's being of service to talk about it freely and openly and joyfully and it totally turns people off all the time and close friends absolutely and but taking a stand and doing it anyway. And really like, I kind of do have to, I have to be a little careful because it can be braggy. But again, like if I lost a hundred pounds and I was telling you about losing a hundred pounds, people would be happy for you. This is the same kind of thing. Like it's something that really is an achievement that helps me be healthy and happy. And why shouldn't I talk about it? And

the fact that you're uncomfortable with it doesn't mean I shouldn't talk about it and sink down to your level. Right. So that's been interesting. And I have lost friends over that. Absolutely. Wow. It's interesting because we'll see, you know, on social media, these physical transformations of people. Here was me six months ago. Here's me now. And a lot of, you'll see a lot of people celebrating that, right? Like, congratulations. It's amazing. It's the encouragement. It's like, look what I was able to do. And I'm so proud of myself. And I wish more people would do that around money too. Look, like I was $30,000 in debt and look at my bank statement now. Like I'm debt free and I've

got a thousand bucks in the bank. You know, Whatever it is. And I think Dave Ramsey celebrates that for people in his kind of community where it's like when they get out of debt, he brings them on the radio show and they kind of announce it. But I don't see this on social media that much. Because that's a safe space because everybody's listening to his show is drink the Kool-Aid. Yeah. You do it in the public space. You are going down. Yeah. Why is that? I don't really know. I don't know. I think about this too.

Like, how did that all get started? When did it become such a dirty thing? It has, I'm sure it has to do with some kind of control. Like some people wanted to control something. So I'm curious about, you know, if you're down to go there about intimate relationships, how has making money impacted you intimately in relationship? I am definitely, that is my Achilles heel right now. So that, and it's been a little weird for me because being a very, I have stories around being a very successful woman and how that's not so feminine and how, yeah, there's a lot of stuff on that. So that's the new frontier, which I'm super psyched about.

Figuring it out. Yeah. What do you feel like is the biggest struggle around that? You know, is it? My own beliefs around it. Totally. Come on now. I know all this.

It's all the same thing, you know, but that's a deep one. And it's kind of a new one, you know, because I haven't been a successful woman for a long time. And so it's interesting. Wow. Yeah. So is this like people just are intimidated by you because you have money or what is that? That's what I think. Because men are supposed to be the providers and supposed to be the providers and to be more successful.

And I don't really even care about that, you know, but I do care about somebody being at the same level of me spiritually and sort of just, you know, just with what they're into and stuff like that. So that's really important to me. Interesting. Yeah. That might be a block for some women. Like if I make more money, will I be in a great intimate relationship if I make more than my partner? Right. Well, the way that it's set up anyway, that is sort of it, you know, that men and, you know, so I just got to find a guy who's either as as who's who's got really good wealth consciousness, who's as successful, who's totally out there. But it's my own story. It's always your own story. Yeah.

is as successful who's totally out there, but it's, it's my own story. It's always your own story. Yeah. What would you coach another woman who says the same thing? Or who's like, they've got a, you know, a successful growing business, or maybe they're, you know, making a million dollars a year in their business or more. Yeah. And they're like, man, I've been struggling because I haven't found a guy who's comfortable with me making this much. They feel like they can't add as much value to the relationship. Right. What would you say to that? Well, of course, Lewis, I have had that client because the second you have an issue, that client shows up.

I don't know if you find like every time because I'm doing this group coaching course. And oh, yeah, like plenty of people in that group have asked me the very question. So what do you say? It's super easy when it's well i know i mean i know the answer but am i like really gonna live it is uh watch your thoughts what are you believing about it what have you decided is true about you about your environment about the way the world works like it's all your thoughts like if you keep harping on it's hard he's not out there i'm to this i'm to that then that is the truth that's what you'll manifest or that you know to think what you want to think is to think the truth so

that's true yeah so it's interesting because my my girlfriend i'll tell you about her a little bit before she's extremely successful in what she does she makes a lot of good money um and i celebrate it i'm like yeah awesome for me it feels great to have someone who's more you know energetically aligned or like more of an equal match even though my business does more than her business but she's making a killing right in her own way and i'm excited for her yeah and it doesn't make me feel like i'm not able to provide as much with her making good money also. For me, it doesn't affect that within me, but maybe 10, 15 years ago, it would have. Maybe I would have felt insecure or not enough because I hadn't worked on my stuff.

Right. So I think it's just finding someone who's in alignment, who's a good match emotionally, spiritually, psychologically as well, who's done the work and doesn't find it intimidating. Exactly. I find it inspiring. I'm like, wow. And here's the interesting thing for me, not to go off on this too much, but for me, something switched in the last like five to eight years where I had this kind of morbid thought where I said, okay, if I'm with a partner and I don't feel like she can be resourceful and I die, can she take care of my kids financially? It was kind of a morbid thought, but I was like, huh. And I struggled in the previous relationships that I was in thinking, would they be able to financially figure it out? If they didn't remarry, if they

didn't find another man to support them financially, if their parents didn't they didn't remarry it's a great thing to think about they didn't find another man to support them financially if they you know their parents didn't fund them right whatever happened if i we had kids i died could they financially be resourceful uh and do things that would make our kids proud of them you know what i mean and so and that's my partner now so it's like she is financially resourceful and and creative enough to generate money if she needed to. Right. But I don't need her to make any more. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Anyway, something to think about there. So that's one of your blocks right now, one of your challenges. Temporary block, yes. You're releasing the block very quickly. Yes, I'm just airing all the laundry here. I hope when I leave this room that it all stays here. Exactly. Yeah. We'll open the window so it goes somewhere else. Yes. I'm just airing all the laundry here. When I leave this room, it all stays here. We'll open the window so it goes somewhere else. Please get a fan. What is the question you get asked by your readers the most that you wish they truly

could hear and believe the answer to? Oh, so many. Well, the one that I said about what do you do when the people closest to you don't support you? Another one is how do you keep the motivation? Like, you know, we go to these seminars, we read books, we listen to the podcast and we're all raring to go. And then a month later you go back in your old patterns. Exactly. Yeah. So. So how do you stay motivated on your vision and on your growth journey well i call it going to the spiritual gym and you've got to have a spiritual gym practice because you do not get to work out physically and then stop going to the gym once you're in shape so just because you got in shape at the seminar or listen to the podcast or whatever you don't get to stop doing stuff so

and it doesn't and you know i'm gonna working so hard to start my business you don't get to stop doing stuff. So, and it doesn't, and you know, it was, I'm going to working so hard to start my business. I don't want to do anything. So it's like, it can be 20 minutes, you know, you working out for 20 minutes a day can do a lot of great things. So it's like spiritual gym workout, meditate for 15, read a self-help book for five. Like what music are you listening to? Who are you hanging out with? What makes you feel like you could flip over a car? Like what what are those things? And do them every single solitary day for 20 minutes. It's not that big a whoop-dee-doo, you know, when you think about that it's going to change your entire life, you know? So, and take it as seriously as anything else, because that work

will make everything else that you're taking seriously and trying to achieve so much easier. And, you know, I'm giving a lot of talks right now. And the thing that I'm just so excited, and I'm so excited to be speaking right now too, because it reminds me, it's my spiritual gym, right? Like we all need it. So, but the thing about, because we are spiritual creatures having a physical experience, right? And if you, and like, instead of just giving it lip service and talking, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know that. But think about it. We are the universal intelligence that created everything that is. We are. Our thoughts are universal intelligence and stuff that created everything that is. Why are we not more stuck up? Why are we not feeling so powerful all of the time? If we're

really going to believe it, if we're really going to go steroids on woo woo and go there and really like if you thought about that all day long about your thoughts being, you know, when you're in alignment, tap into your inner yippy skippy, as I like to call it, and you're there and you're in the flow, it's like it's so exciting. Right. What do you think happens to people that never give, that they just earn for themselves or they keep it in their business and they only put it back in their business, but they don't think about giving outside of the business? I think their growth is stunted. Really? But, you know, to me, again, it falls in the same category as integrity. What happens to someone who cuts corners? You can win, you can prosper to a degree, but all the data tells us and all the life experience tells us that the people with fanatical levels of integrity are the ones that do the biggest stuff. Right. The crooks really don't get ahead at the end of the day.

The people that are selfish, they could get some stuff done. But the people that are selfless, they just have a tendency because people trust them. That trust factor comes in. Things move at the speed of trust as they say and uh all those things come into play and and you just don't become all you were designed to be the other thing that happens with generosity is uh your creativity increases yes because you're releasing chemicals that you don't release when you're selfish. Your productivity increases. The quality of your relationships increase. I was speaking at a little Baptist church in Kentucky one time, beautiful little church, and the guy, many, many years ago,

and the old pastor had been there for 40 years, and I did a tithing lesson, hardcore Baptist tithing lesson, which I love. And the guy came up afterwards, and he goes, well, you left one thing out. Sure, Pastor. You've been doing this longer than me. What did I leave out? He goes, you know, I've been doing this 40 years. I've never had a tithing couple in my church get a divorce.

And I went, why? Because the tithe is magical? Because some people think that in Christianity. Because I don't think that. He said, no, because when you're unselfish with your money, you're unselfish with your wife. And you're unselfish with your husband. And you serve each other in the marriage if you're serving the community

with your giving. It's the same muscle. And he goes, you're just easier to stay married to. When you're tithing, when you're giving. When you're giving. When you make giving a standard part of the rhythm of your life you build that generosity muscle and it affects every relationship you're in particularly the key relationship in marriage it changes the way you parent you know because if you don't give in one area if you say i'm going to

hold back my money and i'm going to keep you here you're probably not going to give generously to your spouse or to your kids or to your friends or community, right? Because it's a character quality. It's like the guy that says, well, I hate the IRS. I hate taxes, so I don't really put everything on my tax return. Okay, so you're a liar. You're a cheater. Where are you going to cheat me?

That's what I started thinking. I'm not impressed. I hate taxes, but I pay every stinking penny, not because I believe in taxes and not because I'm scared of the IRS because neither one of those things are true, but it's because it says something about me. I got to look at me, And that's an integrity issue. It's a every penny, every cash sale of a book on the back table goes into the accounting system,

and we pay freaking taxes on it. I got audited not long ago. I paid precisely zero in the audit. We were so stinking clean. And it's not because I'm scared of those doopers, because I'm really not. They're a pain in the butt, but I'm not scared of them. It's a matter of integrity is integrity is integrity is integrity. Generosity is generosity is generosity is generosity. These things, this stuff, these are character qualities of the

successful people that I've met. Yeah, that's beautiful. Speaking of marriage, it seems like money affects marriages a lot. I'm curious what, or it could empower marriages or could it hurt marriages if not handled properly. I'm curious if you were to give advice on some, a couple dating for, you know, a few years looking to get married, what are a few questions they must have and align to about money that might be uncomfortable to have those questions, but will actually get you clear on, hey, are we the right match in terms of our money mindset, in terms of what we're going to do with money for the next? And maybe you have this question in the first few months of dating.

You don't wait two years. But what are those questions that people should be asking before they align with someone romantically long-term? Well, there's a couple of things to keep in mind. I'm talking to a young couple about this and I do often in a marriage seminar or something like that is our pre-marriage counseling session or something like that. The number one cause of divorce is money fights and money problems out there, the stress of money and the arguments over money. Okay? And so if you said the number one cause of death is getting killed by a bear

on the way to the mailbox, right, then you would analyze how not to get killed by a bear on the way to the mailbox. Yeah. Right? And so if you're going to get married, you should really look at the number one freaking thing. Hello.

This is the number one thing that either hurts or ends marriage is what I'm hearing you say. And the odd thing is, is it's actually circular. It's an infinity loop because it feeds back on itself, meaning that it also, the quality of your marriage is a high data point indicator as to whether or not you build wealth. Yeah. And so very few people drag a spouse kicking and screaming into millionaire status.

You know? You mean it doesn't happen by accident? You know, so I'm bringing the princess with me, right? Come on, baby. I'm going to put you on my back and we're going to haul you over there. It doesn't usually work, okay? Or I'm bringing the guy who's lazy and won't work, and I'm going to outwork him, and the lady says,

and he's a little boy, and I'm going to be his mommy, and I'm going to drag him all the way into millionaire status. Not working, baby. Right. So it goes both directions. So that's thing one. If it's the number one cause, then, yeah, it ought to be something really you discuss.

So preventative maintenance, right? Yes. You know, it's preventative health. If the number one cause of death is obesity, we probably ought to think about obesity, you know? I'm curious then, what's a question a woman should ask to her man, you know, within the first few months of dating about money, where she could get a sense, if he's fully honest and integrity with what he's saying and not just saying something to make her, you know, feel happy. What is a question she can ask to feel like, okay, this man I'm dating and courting, and we're getting into this life with, I feel like I can trust him with money for the future. Yeah. Well, money is a reflection of our values, how we handle money. And that's another reason that it's very important because if your values are not aligned, you're going to struggle in any relationship, but certainly in a marriage relationship.

And so, you know, talk about the basics of money. Debt. I love debt. I'm going to use it all the time. You know, I want zero down everything. I'm going to buy a zero down truck. I'm going to buy a zero down stereo. I'm going to buy a zero down couch.

I'm going to put nothing down on the house. And you hate debt. Okay okay we got a problem we're gonna have to work through this or we're gonna have to this is a deal killer okay how about saving i don't think i'll save money you know you know you'll get you some i always thought you could out earn your stupidity i tried that for years didn't work you know so my wife however is a natural saver right so uh when i joined her club is when we started winning. Yeah. You know, so bless her heart. She didn't know this going in, but I made a hard life for her the first seven years.

So saving and debt, how about generosity? I don't believe you ought to give. If you give, you end up with less. It's mathematically factual, which it is actually. But that's short-term thinking. That's a finite game instead of an infinite game again using simon's premise on his book uh and so general the things we just talked about now how about how about living on are we gonna live in chaos are we gonna live with a

plan yeah i want to live with peace or chaos are we gonna live with future-minded or yolo you know you only live once. Thank God it's Friday. I'm living for the weekend. Our marriage theme song is Huey Lewis and the News, right? I mean, come on. Is this us? And if it is, then, you know, because what's this tell you?

Anyone that lives short-term thinking, we know they're emotionally immature, spiritually immature. And so you're marrying someone or you're dating someone that's emotionally immature, and they're fun. They're always fun, but it's not fun in the long term because it brings about stress. The fruit of this is nasty. And so now do we have to be perfectly aligned on all those things? No, we just need to understand where the other person stands and are they so far over away from us that it's a deal killer yeah because my wife is more of a saver than i am by nature i had saving for me is an intellectual act a spiritual act of my will

it is not a natural rhythm okay she naturally saves everything the leftovers in our refrigerator are grotesque i mean it's just i mean you know, she saves everything. So to the extent that I can stay close to her on that, then we've got harmony. We have both obviously with what we've been through agreed, no doubt. We are both have become planners over the 40 years of marriage. I've always been a detailed planner. I had to get her to join me more on that. So, you know, but it's better if you do it on the front end than the way we did. It's a lot harder than the way we did, but kill each other. So

you want to be in agreement on that. And all the data tells us on marriage and divorce statistics, and we've studied this for years, is number one cause of divorce, money. The other three, if you can be in agreement on them, religion, kids, whether to have them and how to treat them, and how to deal with crazy people in your extended family, your mother-in-law and your lazy brother who does cocaine, and whatever it is. How are you going to deal with it? How to manage it all, yeah.

How to manage boundaries with extended family. And if one of you thinks that children should just be let run wild and the other one is an over-disciplinarian, we're going to have a problem, or I want no children and I want 17, that's going to be an issue. Or i don't believe there's a god and i think anyone who believes there's a god's an idiot oh by the way i think there's a god oh see this is a problem because now i'm an idiot so there you go and so these are the things but if you can agree because all of these things are representative of your values and what your beliefs are so when you can agree on your money

what you've ended up agreeing on is your dreams, your fears, your visions. You're in agreement. You're in alignment on those, not only what they are, but how we're going to go after them then. And you've got a high probability of building wealth. That's the odd part of it. That's the infinity loop. It comes back in on itself. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And I want to remind you, if no one has told you lately that you are loved, you are worthy

and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.