The thing is, that's just what most people say. The reality is quite a different thing. The reality is that most people don't have more money, and there is actually a simple answer to why they don't.
They don't actually do anything to go after it.
Part of the problem lies in how people think about money. To a lot of people, it's magic. Or it's luck. Or they think that only rich people can actually be rich and get richer because they are already rich.
The fact is that most of the rich people in this world did not start off that way. Many started off quite poor and became rich. And the reason that happened for them is that they did want more money and actually wanted more money.
Perhaps the title is making a bit more sense?
Let's go back to what I said about how people think about money. Beyond magic and luck, people think of money in terms of mainly income. Money that is created through a job, or a second or third job, through side gigs, using certain apps and taking surveys. Perhaps they write online and that's a source of income. Or they decide to sell crafts or something else on eBay or some other similar selling site.
All good things, mind you. And there is nothing wrong with doing any of these things to create more income and have more money. But really, the new money is rarely tied to getting ahead. It's tied to simply continuing to get by.
In other words, the objective for getting more income is to spend all of it. And here's another reality. You cannot spend your way to riches.
When I say more money, I am not just talking about earning more. I am talking about all the ways that are out there to actually grow what you have already made. And that's the part most people overlook. Thus, they don't actually want the real money that's available to them.
Because, that part is not a secret. It's not magic or luck. It's simply knowing where the money is and taking the time to learn how to get it.
It's not the easy way. Not necessarily. I mean, to me it is. But I have been doing it a long time and know my way around. That learning process didn't happen overnight. Nor did growing my stash. And that is also the reason a lot of people avoid it.
The stock market.
People think of it as a private organization. An exclusive club. A place for the rich to play high stakes games, sometimes at the expense of the little guy with pockets less full.
That can't be farther from the truth. But of course, I will repeat what I said before. You just have to know what you are doing. The question is, if the stock market is one of the best sources of money and one of the best opportunities to actually become rich, why don't more people do it?
Because again, it's no secret. In fact, when you look at the Forbe's Richest list published every year, a good many of the people on that list made their money through investments. Yeah, a lot of them own businesses. Sure. Of course. But owning a business and making a lot of money doesn't necessarily mean running it or even having started it.
Many of the people on the Forbe's list are simply investors.
The stock market can be complicated. I want to be clear about that. I mean, it is not always complicated. Take a guy like Warren Buffet. He takes the easiest approach there is to investing. He simply buys low—and in his case rarely ever sells. He rides on the waves of successful companies and collects dividends as they continue to grow and operate.
That is where and how he had made most of his money.
A great book to read if you want to know how Warren does it is called The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham. To some it is considered to be the Bible of Basic Investing. If you wanted to call it something else, you could call it the nuts and bolts of making money by buying solid businesses.
I am going to tell you that reading Graham's book might be one the most valuable reads you may ever read, aside from maybe the Bible Itself if you happen to be religiously inclined. It is the key that opens the door to the vault of knowledge secured behind it.
It dispels the magic and the luck theories.
Going back to the income thing, think about this for a second. It goes right along with that how people think about money thing. College. For some it's a big deal. If you want to have a good income you need to have a degree that gets you a good job.
But even that, having a good job, does it serve one to really get ahead? The answer is mostly no. No good job really gets anyone ahead. Investing the money they earn does. And again, the people who actually want more money know this. It's why they have money.
Besides the fact that many non-college degree jobs pay more than degreed jobs do. Plumbers and electricians make a lot of money. So do welders and factory workers—depending on the job of course. A guy working in a brewery might make over $80,000 a year easily while someone working in a cereal factory might be closer to about $40,000-$50,000 a year.
Back in the day I worked for a Coca-Cola bottling plant on the factory floor and made over $60,000 a year. And that was more than 20 years ago.
But that's not my point. Just an illustration. I have always worked and continue to work to this day even though I don't really have to. But the second part of that, even if I don't really have to, is because I never spent all of what I made.
I invested.
Moreover, I took the time to learn how to invest. I learned about the stock market. I even went beyond what Warren Buffet does and learned other aspects of investing such as writing covered call options contracts and that sort of thing.
I actually wanted more money and continue to want more money. To actually want it, achieving it through doing things that actually make it. By not wasting my time seeking out high incomes or time-consuming side gigs exclusively just to chase the next payday and do nothing more than get by.
There is one other thing I did. Rather than lambaste and scold the rich, or even be envious of them, I studied them. I wanted to know what they did to get there. I wanted to know how they did it.
The bottom line is that simply wanting more money doesn't more money make. Only actions can do that. Only an active interest and participation in things that make money and create wealth will do it. Either you can sit back beneath the table of the rich and wait for crumbs to land on your plate. Or you can sit at the table with them and have your own plate.
The choice is entirely yours. But it is up to you. The opportunity is not lacking. You true desire to get at it is.
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