Hi. I’m James. I worked in sales and I’m interested in business development. I joined organizations that offered training and opportunities for people who are interested.

I read Rich Dad Poor Dad and Secrets of The Millionaire Mind and I want to be ultra successful.

The idea is to build up large amounts of assets and passive income so I’m free to travel, slack off and help people become successful.

I believe that will power and never giving up is a key factor in success. That’s why I’m willing to learn the skills to be financially successful. After all when I get all the money I need I’ll be okay right?

I started work at 18 to learn business skills because we didn’t have funding to continue school and I was taught that they don’t teach you how to be a successful business owner in school.

I figure that my strategy is pretty okay. I learned it from books and seminars and successful people. Dad was right however they won’t teach you everything and unless you’re super sharp, you might would miss the important points.

Let’s discuss the goal. Be rich, make lots of money, buy lot’s of nice stuff stuff and help lots of people. Sounds like a good plan. My question is why do you want to use that plan?

I’ll be honest here. My issue is insecurity.

  • I wanted dad to be proud of me.
  • I wanted to help my mom. (Which of course, is because I wanted her to be proud of me.)
  • I wanted everyone to be proud of me.

I wanted to show off to people so I’ll hear them say I’m a successful person. That I’m worth something. That I’m worthy of love.

My friends say I have child like (I hope they mean genuine) courage, dedication, faith and commitment. I also realized I have the need for acknowledgment and the angst of a teenager.

I’ll go to war for you simply because you said nice things about me. (But that’s for another story).

This is why I wanted to get rich.

Here’s the problem. Making a profit takes time. Learning to make a profit took me longer.

I had the idea that successful people have nice houses, cars, gadgets and stuff.

To compensate and to “appear successful” I bought more stuff. This is embarrassing but I had magazine collections, book collections, toy collections, weapon collections, jacket collections, collection of clothes, skin care products, supplements. To take things further I collected notes, boxes, bottles, pictures, souvenir, tags, recipts, letters, et cetera. I was a hoarder.

I saw having things was an accomplishment so I “had things.”

This mindset didn’t manifest in my physical possessions but in how I spent my time and how I spent my money.

I started with a really low salary and my pay got higher but the thing was I spent it on unnecessary things.

I did projects that were unprofitable and stuck on even if I didn’t enjoy them anymore or no longer was benefiting from it. I did a couple of small business ventures and the only reason why I signed in was to be able to call myself an entrepreneur.

I asked myself. “What if everything I’m believing is wrong?”

What if everything I’m learning is not for me?

What if I just teach myself instead of learning from others. This could be more fun anyway.

I decided to rewrite my lessons. It started with this blog minimal changes.

At the top of my head here are a few lessons I learned:

Grow a spine. You don’t need to care about what other people think. It’s your happiness and not theirs. Making sacrifices to look good will make you feel like an idiot later in life.

Appreciate the words less and simple. These words get a bad reputation for being lazy, poor and it gives us the idea of lack. I had a wealth of stuff and an abundance of trash. After I grew a spine, just as I believe non supportive people’s opinions don’t matter I also believe that having more stuff isn’t what matters. In the past if you offered to fill my room with anything I want to put in it I would jump up and down because of excitement. Now if you made a similar offer I’d ask you if it would be nice enough to help me remove some other stuff from my room instead. I’m happy with my less than 100 things. Thank you very much. There are other things I want but that’s not too urgent. I’m working on increasing my income but I’m also working hard on reducing my unnecessary spending. A lot of these things aren’t beneficial anyway. Not wanting something is usually better than possessing it. For some reason this mindset makes sense for me.

Your resources are limited. Psalm 90:12 says teach us to number our days aright that we may gain a heart of wisdom. Forget the abundance and the you can have everything bullshit “The Secret ” fed you and let’s be honest here. If you were to do the math. Your money is limited. Your time is limited. Your attention is limited. Be wise with how you spend it. We all have answers the question, what if you only had one day to live. That’s because you know that it won’t happen soon. Ask yourself the question what if you only had this much income for the rest of your life? How would you play your cards? Limits are what make life beautiful. Just as Achieles said mortals are beautiful because life here is temporary and Batman said you can’t be courageous when you’re indestructible (referring to Superman) it’s these limitations are what will make you think of better solutions for your life. Its not about doing it all. I fucked up my life trying to do that. It’s doing what matters really well.

Write your own instructions. With the exception of the Bible, I stopped reading inspirational books, motivational books, business books, self help books how to get rich books etc. Reading made me feel incomplete. Reading them made me feel unreliable and unworthy. I wanted to be them and not me. My life became one where I imitated these people I looked up to.

In the end people mean more than stuff. All these cheesy things like faith, hope and love bring more joy than anything I think money can buy for me.

This post is not about going broke or trying to grow broke. I wrote this because at the start of minimal changes I asked myself why I needed the things I think I needed. This is to remind me to keep asking myself this question. I hope it encourages you too.

What did you look like to before you started reading minimal changes?


Thank you for reading.

Got a question or want to share something? Email me.

Want updates? Join my mailing list. Let's connect.