Spiritual Investing #6/7: Secrets Of The Spiritual Investor

Today we're going to talk about the secrets of the successful spiritual investors.

I want to show you clearly,

Step by step,

Exactly how wealthy and successful people think about investments and relate to money.

And that will lead you to a much better life,

To making more money,

More prosperity,

More security,

Less fear,

And you can make a bigger difference in the world.

I'm also going to contrast that with a lot of the behaviors that poor and middle class people have learned that are actually holding us back.

And as always,

I say this with love.

I grew up in a very typical middle-class household and I got a wretched financial education.

My parents were doing the best they could,

But they didn't know this stuff either,

Right?

One of the awesome things about the internet is that all this information about how to relate to money,

To how rich people act,

Is all available to us.

That was never true before in history.

And I've been fortunate to learn a lot of this,

To have been exposed to very wealthy and successful people,

Starting with my best friend in junior high,

Whose grandpa was worth tens of millions of dollars.

I've learned so much,

Though it took me decades to figure it out,

How it really works and embody it.

So let's talk about this.

So first thing,

How do wealthy people look at money?

Well,

It's very different than the way most poor middle-class people look at money.

So to put it in a nutshell,

Most poor people are just scrambling to make it to the end of the week,

The end of the month,

Until the next paycheck comes.

Again,

I don't mean that as criticism,

I've been there,

Right?

That's just how it goes.

Middle-class people,

Especially if you have a salary job,

A decent income,

You have enough money every month to meet your bills and you save a little bit,

Right?

So you save up for a while and then you splurge,

You buy a new car,

You go on a big trip to Hawaii,

Right?

You get a new stereo system,

Whatever.

There's nothing wrong with that.

The trouble is those two approaches will not build your wealth,

Will they?

And I grew up middle-class and that's exactly what I saw in my parents,

That they had a salary and they paid the mortgage and the food and insurance and all that.

And we had a little money left over and every now and then we go splurge it,

Right?

Every couple of years you got a new car,

Maybe you go on a trip,

You buy some new ski equipment,

A new TV,

Whatever.

The trouble is you're not moving forward,

Right?

You're kind of running on a treadmill.

The way wealthy and successful people see it is they always live on a budget.

They are always saving,

Always investing,

But also balancing that with enjoying their life.

And this is so important because most people think,

Especially if you grew up poor and middle-class,

You think,

Oh my gosh,

I want to be rich because I hate living on a budget,

Right?

I hate only having so much money for food or clothes.

And we think,

Oh,

I want to be rich so I can buy whatever I want,

Right?

That's not how it works,

In case you didn't know.

All wealthy,

Successful,

Rich people who want to stay wealthy,

Successful,

And rich,

They all live on budgets.

And they're always saving,

Always investing,

But balancing that with enjoying their life.

And the only difference is their budgets have bigger numbers.

I had a great example to this.

I remember being in a dentist's office years ago and they would think it was a People magazine and they had an actress.

I think it was Zoe Deschanel,

I could be saying her name wrong.

She was the star of the new TV series at that time,

New Girl.

And it was so interesting because they published her budget and she was making $90,

000 a month from the TV show.

But she had a budget,

Rent,

Food,

Insurance,

Car,

Et cetera,

Right?

Part of it was short-term saving,

Part of it was long-term saving.

She also budgeted $5,

000 a month for clothing.

And this is the point I want you to see.

Do you think you could survive only being able to spend five grand a month on clothing?

I think I could live with that,

Right?

But notice her budget was not buy whatever I want in terms of clothing because I'm rich.

No,

That leads you to be poor.

It was $5,

000 a month.

She also had short-term investment,

Long-term investment,

Right?

And that was then diversified,

Right?

Some real estate,

Some stocks,

Some bonds,

Gold and silver,

Whatever,

Right?

Talk to your financial advisor about that.

But the point is wealthy and successful people all live on a budget and they always budget for saving as well as spending.

Because after all,

If all you do is grind away and work and save money until the day you die,

It's not really doing anything for you,

Is it?

Right?

There's a lot of people that have saved too much money for retirement.

They should have gone on the trip to Hawaii,

Right?

They should have bought a new car.

They should have got front row tickets to the Laker game or whatever your thing is.

Other people save too little.

I don't you to do either.

I want you to start budgeting right now because you need to learn to take good care of your money.

This is really important because if you take good care of your money,

The universe will give you more.

It really will.

One of the biggest psychological blocks to poor middle-class people,

Including me,

Right?

Was we think,

Oh,

I'll worry about investing and saving and budgeting all that when I'm rich.

No,

That will keep you poor middle-class for the rest of your life.

You start acting,

Thinking like a wealthy person right now.

Even if you can only save $1 a month,

You start budgeting and saving that $1 a month.

Why?

You need to show the universe you're going to take good care of your money.

It's kind of like when I was a kid,

Me and my sister wanted to get a cat,

But my parents said,

Wait a second,

We don't want to get you a cat until you can prove to us that you're responsible,

That you'll take care of the cat.

So my parents said,

We'll get you both a goldfish.

And if you can keep that goldfish alive for six months and we don't have to do it all,

Then we'll get a cat.

And I remember I got my goldfish,

His name was Gus,

And I was motivated.

I really wanted a cat,

So I took great care of that goldfish.

And I showed my parents,

I'm going to feed the goldfish,

I'm going to change the water,

I'm going to do all these things.

And after a period of time,

Me and my sister showed our parents,

We can take care of the fish and we got a cat.

And just so you know,

The universe acts kind of like that.

The universe will give you a little bit of money and it wants to see how you take care of it.

If you blindly spend it,

Go into huge debt,

Don't budget,

Don't save,

Don't think about investing,

That's not taking care of it,

Right?

And the universe will say,

Tsk,

Tsk,

Bad,

Bad,

Bad.

We're not going to give you any more money until you take better care of what you have now.

So you don't have to be rich to think about these things,

Right?

That was a huge obstacle for me.

I always figured,

Oh,

I'll worry about investing and stocks and all that when I'm rich.

No.

Why do you think it took me so long to make money?

Why do you think I kept losing it,

Right?

So here's a couple of shocking facts that give you a lot of insight into how wealthy and successful people operate.

And these may surprise you.

Number one,

There's a saying that the average millionaire has gone bankrupt three and a half times.

And I don't know what that's based on,

Or if it's literally true,

But I think there's a lot of power there.

What does it mean?

Wealthy and successful people aren't afraid to take risk and they aren't afraid to lose.

Because the only way you're going to win big is by playing a big game.

And when you play a big,

You're going to have big losses.

So I'm not saying be silly or foolish or go blow money on a huge risky investment.

No.

What I'm saying is don't be so terrified of coming out of your comfort zone that you stay there the rest of your life.

Most people are so terrified of taking risk,

Of losing everything,

Of going bankrupt.

They never get in the game and they can never get wealthy.

So identify intelligent risk.

Like I said,

Good risk reward.

Go take a risk.

Until you're willing to fail,

You can never succeed.

And that's what it comes from.

And the funny thing is for me,

I couldn't become a millionaire until after I went bankrupt.

Thankfully,

It wasn't three and a half times.

Knock on wood,

Only one so far in this life.

But the bankruptcy was really important to me in a weird way to help me move ahead financially.

Because I proved to myself I could lose everything and it was brutal and horrible and painful and I hope it never happens again.

But I could prove to myself I could do it.

I could rebuild.

And because of the subconscious financial thermostat,

Within five years,

I had made back all the money I had lost.

There is a thermostat.

So trust the universe to support you.

Don't be afraid of going after a big opportunity if the reward is worth it.

Second thing I want to emphasize,

And this is,

I read in one of my friend's books.

Surprising,

Shocking fact.

Did you know that immigrants to the United States are more than three times more likely than native-born citizens to become a millionaire?

Yes,

Three times more likely.

And let's face it,

Most immigrants have huge disadvantages.

Many do not speak the language.

They're unfamiliar with the culture.

They may have degrees,

Medical degree,

Whatever that doesn't transfer,

That's not recognized here.

You have surgeons who are driving cabs,

Right?

But they're three times more likely to become millionaires.

Why?

They're willing to fail.

They're willing to do the dirty work.

They're willing to do the jobs no one else wants.

And they're willing to take risks and lose it all.

So again,

Don't take foolish risks,

But you have to be willing to fail.

You have to be willing to get out there and give it a shot and play in a big game.

And maybe you lose.

But if you keep playing,

You will win big.

And the good news is it doesn't matter how many times you fail.

You only have to succeed big once.

Another big difference between the wealthy and very successful people and all the rest of us,

Right,

Is the way they think about money.

And this shows up in subconscious beliefs.

So what are some of the things that poor middle-class people think?

They think,

Oh,

I'll worry about investments when I'm rich.

No,

Start thinking and investing right now.

Again,

Even if it's only a dollar a month,

Even if you budget and save one dollar a month,

That's showing the universe you take care of the money,

Right?

That will help to move you forward.

Another thing I want to talk about quickly,

A lot of you may know this,

Is the difference between good debt and bad debt.

Pretty simple.

Good debt is something that's making you more money over time.

And one of the things I've learned about very wealthy and successful people is they make most of their money by having an asset,

Taking a loan against that asset,

And investing the money at a place where it will earn a higher rate of return than their interest they're paying.

And that's enormous,

Right?

So good debt gives you valuable assets that you can use as collateral to put in more investments that make more than you're paying in interest,

Right?

So for many people,

Mortgage is good debt.

Why?

Without that,

You couldn't afford to buy the house,

Right?

Most middle-class people could never afford to pay cash for the home they live in,

Unless you're really lucky,

Got a big inheritance or something,

Right?

So that's good debt.

Bad debt is something that's costing you money over time.

So credit card debt is generally bad because you're paying 20,

30% interest and then just pissing it away,

Right?

So you want to pay that off as soon as you can.

For many people,

A car loan is bad debt.

Now,

Of course,

If you really need the car for whatever reason,

Then it's worthwhile,

Right?

But a lot of people spend too much on their car.

The reason it's bad debt is the instant you drive the car off a lot,

It depreciates 20%.

So you don't want to be going into debt for a depreciating asset.

And of course,

There's exceptions,

Right?

Talk to your financial advisor.

I'm just giving you new ways to think about this because that's how very wealthy and successful people think about it.

Debt is neither good nor bad in terms of morality.

It's just functional,

Right?

Debt that makes you more money is good.

Debt that loses you money is bad.

All billionaires have enormous amounts of debt.

They do.

Why?

They're leveraging their assets as collateral to borrow money to earn a higher rate of return.

So that's an enormously important thing.

So in terms of debt,

Just look for good debt.

Don't worry about how much debt you're in.

In fact,

If you look at high finance,

There is such a thing as not having enough debt.

That some companies,

Their stock price drops because the market sees them as not having enough debt.

What does that mean?

It means that they can take on debt using their assets as collateral to earn a big return.

So when you do that,

You just leave money on the table.

The last thing I want to say is that most very successful and wealthy people,

At least those that own their money versus being owned by their money,

They believe in themselves.

And they believe that even if they fail in a huge way,

They have the ability to do it again if they have to.

They don't want to,

Right?

No one wants to go bankrupt,

Lose millions of dollars,

Right?

But you need to have the confidence that if you do,

You can rebuild.

You'll be okay.

Trust the thermostat.

You're seeing a pattern here?

Yes.

I read an interview with Richard Branson once,

Billionaire,

Right?

Founded all sorts of really successful companies.

And they asked him,

They said,

Hey Richard,

Aren't you terrified that you could lose all your money,

Go bankrupt and have nothing?

And he laughed and he kind of said,

Of course,

I'm a little bit afraid of it,

But not really.

It might happen.

But even if I lost everything,

I would still be me.

I would just have to start again and get a job and start accumulating assets and looking for opportunity.

And it may take me a long time,

But I'm totally confident I could make the money again.

That's how wealthy people see it.

At least those that are consistently wealthy,

Right?

Is again,

There's a difference between you on your money versus your money owns you.

I want you to own your money.

The last little bit I'll give you here is about how money works in the thermostat,

Right?

Answer your questions,

Help you move ahead in life.

Awesome.

So go ahead and do that.

Thank you very much.

So last thing I'll offer is this.

If you were to take all the money in the world and redistribute it equally overnight so that everyone woke up tomorrow,

Having exactly the same amount of money,

We'd be back to close to where we are now within 6,

12,

18 months,

Certainly within five years.

In other words,

Imagine that we got blasted back to the natural disaster and wealth is measured by the size of your mud hut and how many coconuts you have,

Right?

It's just a matter of time before people like Bill Gates and Elon Musk and Richard Branson live in a really big mud hut and have a huge pile of coconuts.

And all the people that are poor today would have very small mud huts and very small coconut piles.

Why?

That's how energy works.

That's the subconscious financial thermostat,

Right?

This is why consistently wealthy and successful people trust themselves and they're willing to take risks.

Because again,

If you're going to win big,

You have to play in a big game,

But be careful,

Don't be foolish,

Right?

But believing yourself and trusting the universe will support you.

If you can surrender to the divine support,

You'll make money much faster,

Much more easily than kicking and screaming from the ego trying to make sure.

That will wipe you out.

So I hope you found this useful and valuable and we'll see you soon for day seven of our series on spiritual investing.

And I'll see you very soon for the end of our series.

I'm Brett Michael Phillips signing off.

Until next time,

Please take care and namaste.