“Nothing is impossible, the word itself says ‘I’m possible’!” Audrey Hepburn

I’ve been fortunate to know personally many folks of great wealth. Most of these individuals did not inherit wealth, but earned it the old fashioned way, through hard work. Many are entrepreneurs,

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some are not. My dad’s best friend worked for the IRS for many years, was an investor of the side, and died recently with a $10 million dollar estate. 

Here are common traits of HIGH NET WORTH individuals.

EDUCATION

Most of the wealthy in the U.S.A. have at least a college degree. Many have masters and doctoral degrees as well. The research is clear, college graduates earn more than those without. 

According to an InContext article from Indiana University (2006 data) entitled, Earnings of a Lifetime, greater education leads to higher lifetime earnings. Over a lifetime, those with a high school diploma can expect to earn $910,000 versus $1.1 million dollars for an Associates Degree. By retirement, those with a Bachelor’s degree or higher can expect, on average to earn $1.8 million dollars. That is almost a 100% advantage to college graduates! 

Complete college and boost your lifetime earnings. 

DELAY GRATIFICATION

Although a quick google search led to many articles linking wealth with delayed gratification, let’s look at acutal data. I discussed a research study, conducted in the 1960′s by psychologist Walter Mischel, with 4 year olds which found that those who delayed gratifiaction were more successful later in life. Does this relate to wealth as well? Think about it, if you are buying everything you want NOW, how will you be able to save large amounts of money for the homes, vacations, and retirement of the future. Simple, you won’t. 

Like in weight loss, if you eat everything you want right now, you will be fat; spend all your money now, and you’ll be poor. 

ACTION

The wealthy dive in and take action. They do not let their fear stop them. Actually, several of my blogging colleagues are on the action path, starting multiple blogs (Budgeting in the Fun Stuff & Extra Money Blog), creating products (Mark Riddix), and offering important services (Chicago Financial Planner). All of these action-oriented self starters have achieved or are on the way to future wealth. 

You must be willing to take calculated risks and FAIL. The difference between the doers and the dreamers is this; the doers dive in and take steps toward their dreams and the dreamers just dream. The cool thing about amassing a high net worth is that you don’t have to earn an extraordinary salary. But you do need to supplement your income with side hustles; consulting, side businesses, investing, real estate ownership etc. And, I guarantee that if you live extravagantly and above your means, you will remain a slave to the paycheck to paycheck life. 

PERSISTENCE

Many manyentrepreneurs give up just before they become successful. Whoopi Goldberg’s advice includes, “Develop a Second Skin,” (The View). Expect roadblocks, criticism, setbacks and detours. No one has “smooth sailing” along the path to wealth. Keep your goals WRITTEN DOWN and VISIBLE. Review them when you’re down. Commit to continue, no matter what. 

El Carino tells a story of his college roommate who was up in the middle of the night working on a difficult math problem. El Carino asked the roomate, “Why don’t you turn off the light and go to bed, it’s well past midnight?” The roommate replied, “I’m not stopping until I complete the problem. I’m working on it for as long as it takes.” Guess where his roomate is now? CEO of a Fortune 500 company! 

Read any success story biography, think of anyone you know who is successful, and you will find someone who doesn’t take “no” for an answer. 

ACTION STEP:

Get a notebook, label it: “(your name) Personal Finance” and store it by the computer. Use it to keep all of your personal finance goals, thoughts, activities, and plans. 

Choose a person or two that you admire. Ask them about their “success stragies.” Write in and tell me what they say!  

Check out passive income ideas to boost your cash flow!

For a quick overview of Investing Strategies, pick up my FREE eBook; 20 Minute Guide to Investing (top right of the page). If you like what you’re reading, sign up for my RSS feed and follow me on twitter so you get the word immediately.   

What are other traits that lead to wealth building? 

Barbara Friedberg Personal Finance across the blogosphere:

My work was recently showcased at these sites. Why not stop by and check out the excellent articles? 

• Invest it Wisely-Week-end Reading Gale
• Money Crashers- Festival of Frugality
• Credit Wise Info-Carnival of Personal Finance
• Beating the Index-Rising Oil Prices May Threaten Economic Recovery
• My Personal Finance Journey-Carnival of Passive Investing
• Money Crashers-Carnival of Money Stories
• Wealth Informatics-Totally Money Carnival

image credit; highpitch 

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Categories: values, personal finance, net worth

“A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone.”
Henry David Thoreau 

Only you can decide what you want to focus on in your life. It is up to you to choose whether to live to “keep up with the Jone’s” or to determine your own priorities. Thoreau was a master at living life according to his own rules. If you set the rules for your life, including what you want, how to spend your time, how you spend your money; then you can define your own happiness.

Main Topic

I have spent many years managing money, both personally and professionally. My personal finance background includes an MBA and work experience in the financial field. Here are the basics I have learned about money and life:

ü      Making your money grow is more about time than anything else.

ü      Start as young as possible and you can build substantial wealth.

ü      Managing your finances can be broken down into a few simple steps; it does not need to be complicated.

ü      Happiness comes from what you choose to focus on!

ü      After your basic needs for food, clothes, and shelter are met, more money does not equal more happiness.

ü       Your net worth does not equal self worth or serenity.

OK, if this sounds way too simple, indulge me for a moment and read on. Think about some of your habits, both good and bad; i.e. eat chips for a snack, leave clothes on the floor after taking them off, put off work until the last minute, brush your teeth twice daily, avoid activities you don’t like, give to charity, listen carefully when others speak, work-out, or do volunteer work. I’m sure you could list scores more. Now, some of your habits are really productive and work for you like brushing your teeth twice a day. Whereas, if you eat too many chips too often, you get fat, high cholesterol, and heart disease.

 The premise of BarbaraFriedbergPersonalFinance is quite simple. Learn good money and attitude habits, practice them regularly and improve your life. Many of you don’t have the knowledge of information to improve your mental and financial life. If you stick with me, every blog entry will give you a small task to practice which will improve your financial literacy and your money management HABITS. Let me be clear, the personal finance you will learn is not just my opinion. NO, it is informed by research about WHAT WORKS. You will also find that people selling you financial advice to make a profit for themselves are not selling you the best products for you!!! In a nutshell, you are going to learn to manage your money so you will have enough for what’s important to you and some left over for future spending. Finally, you will learn to handle all money tasks FAST and make many of them AUTOMATIC.

Now what does all this have to do with happiness. Happiness can also be practiced and learned! I’m not saying that you will never feel negative emotions, because that is impossible or even desirable. What I am saying that you can learn to create a happy mindset for yourself and increase your life contentment!

Practical Application

 I want to help you get started today. Because the sooner you begin developing sound money and contentment habits, the better your life will be. So let’s get started with some personal finance 101. When you are trying to lose weight, you usually begin by stepping on the scale to find out how much you weigh. That is how you measure your progress!

In personal finance, no matter how scary it might be, you have to begin where you are right now, not where you wish you were. That means, taking stock of how much money you have if you sold everything and converted it to cash. Simply put, it means adding up-

WHAT YOU OWN:

ü      Bank accounts

ü      Savings accounts

ü      Brokerage/mutual fund accounts

ü      Retirement accounts

ü      Value of your house

ü      Value of your car

 And then subtracting-

 WHAT YOU OWE:

ü      Mortgage loan

ü      Student loan

ü      Credit card debt

ü      Other debt

 What’s left is called your NET WORTH. If the final tally is positive, that’s good, you own more than you owe. If the final result is negative, you owe more than you own. And, that’s a problem.

Just like stepping on the scale is sometimes unpleasant, the same is sometimes true about completing your Net Worth.

 In fact, by now, you may be thinking that figuring out my Net Worth will definitely not make me happy! Don’t worry, I get it.

 Before you get to the Rich and Happy part, you have to pay your dues and go through the struggle; just like success in weight loss, success in your job, or learning a new skill. The happiness comes after you face up to reality and start stepping towards money and life control.

Action Step:

Get a notebook and label it: “(your name) Personal Finance” and keep it by the computer. Use it to keep all of your personal finance thoughts, activities, and plans.